I'm glad
by planet p
Summary: AU; Miss Parker gets kidnapped and finds out something she decides to further investigate. Emily/Lyle
1. Chapter 1

**I'm glad** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters; nor do I own the songs, _I Only Want To Be With You_, _The Saddest Thing_, or _Bring Back My Heart_, their music or lyrics.

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><p>The music, if that was what it was - that was what they called it, nonetheless - was loud; too loud, he could barely hear himself think over the din. The strobing lights and "music" were physically painful. He'd come along, without his "ever-present shadow", as Parker had dubbed her brother most recently. The zombie's shadow. A charming nickname, he'd thought. Sarcastically, of course. He'd have brought the boy, but then the boy mightn't have still <em>been<em> the boy. Lately, it hadn't escaped his attention the difficulty his "shadow" seemed to be having with sustaining an even persona. His mood would change from moment to moment, influenced by the tiniest little thing. He'd decided it safer to leave the boy out of it: So, alone.

The energy in the nightclub, the atmosphere, most certainly wouldn't have done Lyle any favours, and Raines had a feeling he knew how that would have ended. He didn't have a particularly strong urge to see his "son" blubbering about something that hadn't even happened to him, his ratty no-good-for-nothing boyfriend who hadn't dumped him. He always seemed to go for the women. Either that, or the children. The kid could go around town collecting them all, like the Pied Piper or something; they always seemed to gravitate towards him, and he to them. So he was careful to keep that impulse under control in front of his team, but that didn't mean it wasn't there, that he didn't feel like a total ratbag for not smiling at the little kid who smiled at him and said "hello". Thankfully, he'd never had that affliction, Raines thought, as he glanced around him at the mass of people supposably dancing. Dancing or not, he didn't see how people could find it enjoyable. Get him out there and he'd be hyperventilating in ten seconds flat. It was kind of lucky, then, he supposed, that he wasn't here to "dance".

No, he was only here to look. At someone very specific, actually. _For_ someone very specific. At first, the feelings had been... just vague, then they'd started to grow stronger, little by little, until he'd had a trail to follow, which he had, and now, here he was: end of the trail.

_Shit!_

He wanted to say, no, no way, it wasn't _bloody_ possible, but, clearly, it _was_. He'd Healed Catherine, bullet to the brain, and all. Was it so impossible, then, to think that one could be Healed after a major vital organ had been removed? He tried not to wince, just thinking about it. Actually, yes, it was so Goddamn impossible! Cat's brain hadn't been removed, it had just been... rearranged, a little bit. So, okay, some of it had been... missing, but he'd done alright with it, hadn't he? He'd got her back in some semblance of working order. _He_ had! But how would Jarod have come by a Healer for Kyle? How the Hell? And one who could regrow new hearts for people. It was pretty bloody unbelievable! But he knew what Kyle would say: You didn't believe I had a guardian angel, did you? Bet you're rethinking that, now, huh?

Yes, well, not really, he thought to himself. He knew very well who Kyle's guardian angel had been, and he knew that they - that _he_ - was not a Healer. Just an Empath.

For a moment, he wanted to laugh; thought, ridiculously, _Just a Time Lord_. Ridiculous. The boy was not an alien, he was just... different. Different, even, underneath, to the person he met almost every day, the person he was allowed to see. Over the years, he had come to accept that he would probably never know the boy... fully. Bobby would always remain the closest he'd come, the strange, sad boy.

He was sitting at the bar, chatting with a woman who could have been of Italian ancestry. Raines didn't get any closer, he could tell it was Kyle, and that he was alive; that he wasn't a clone who'd been artificially aged with Healer intervention, if that sort of thing really worked. His energy was Kyle's, and if he'd been a clone, it would have been someone else's, just not Kyle's.

He was actually glad, now, that he hadn't brought the boy. He'd have... lost it. Kyle was alive! His "brother" was alive! Not dead! He'd probably have dumped himself on the floor and started bawling his eyes out, or laughing: neither which would have been very desirable. It was time, he decided now, to leave. Before Kyle noticed him.

Whoever had Healed him, he had to trust that they'd kept in contact, and that they were looking out for him. No option.

.

Lyle was smiling, a bit of a shy, little gleam in his eye, and Raines refrained from sighing heavily and posting anything on Cherry's website to the effect of: Do NOT bring your bratty, mangy offspring to work, the LUNATIC can't HANDLE it! HELLO, PEOPLE, SOCIOPATH! Clearly, whoever it was he'd inadvertently wound up borrowing his mood from, she had been a she, a teenage she. What was it always with the females? He did _have_ a sister - she wasn't "missing" anymore, so, for heck sake, why couldn't he make friends with her, instead of - all the time - landing himself as Enemy Number One! It was impossible! The boy was just unfa-

He looked away, resisting the urge to run a hand down his face. No, not with the girlish giggling! That was just... disturbing!

Making a face, Angelo quickly crossed the dining hall and sat down opposite Lyle, staring at him seriously. Was he a teenage girl? No. So what was up? Merchant, still standing in line for something to eat, suddenly noticed that she'd lost Angie and looked around her. Spying him over at one of the tables, she got an _Oh, right_ look on her face and went back to thinking about food, food, foooood. Mmm, food...

Snapping out of his thoughts - or rather, Persey's thoughts - Angelo decided, now that he was having one of his very-fun lucid moments, to send the Empath sitting across from him an Empath message.

Lyle stared at him with a frown. _What are you saying, boy-O? That my sister's loose? Well, guess what, it takes _two_ to play that game! You're totally mean mean mean!_

Angelo smiled on the inside. It'd worked, hadn't it?

Lyle narrowed his eyes at him, in a temper, and looked away, to the noticeboard.

Angelo rolled his eyes, and they actually did do that funny, rolly thing. He refrained from leaping out of his seat and hurrying over to show Persephone. _Oi, you, Empath thing!_

_I'm not a thing!_ came the angry response.

_Like, whatever, Barbie!_

_Yuck!_

_Oh, you didn't see yourself before. Raines was way freaking. Don't make Pet Master nervous - very bad, Pet! You bad Pet! Must not be given... You don't eat chocolate, anyway, so what's the use..._ He gave a mental sigh. _Strange Pet. Strange, strange Pet._

_Shut up! I'm not strange, I'm mad! Bon-kers! Mel is strange, not me. Strange is cute... ish. Mel's cute. I'm not cute, Ange, I'm a fucking stark-raving lunatic! Don't show me that shit again, stat!_

_Wrong use of word, my friend. 'Stat' is like 'right away'. Immediately, nurse! 'Okay' is more appropriate._

_Who cares! _Nada_, Kenny! Give it a rest with the _Earth to lunatic_ crap. You're not supposed to interrupt a dog when it's eating - and you shouldn't interrupt a lunatic when he's thinking loony thoughts, either!_

_Except-_

_Except _nothing_, Ken!_

_You weren't thinking loony thoughts, you were in the Zone. And not the same kind of zone as Jarod and Kyle._

_Newsflash, Baby Blue, Kyle is dead!_

_Then he's in the Dead Zone._

_No, he's not! He's just in the- In the Gone Away Zone! Stupid, stupid crap... zones!_

_Someone misses Kyle!_ Angelo teased.

_Shut up!_

_You hardly even knew him._

_Shut up!_

_What's the big deal? You're always getting so worked up whenever someone mentions him. I don't understand you._

_Look, Mr. Psychiatrist, I think you're overlooking something very vital here!_

_Huh? Hit me, baby!_

_You go ask Persey to spank you, if you're into that sort of thing._

_Um, a saying! You're always going about calling people 'baby'._

_Me. Lunatic. Not you, Ange._

_Overlooking what?_

_Oh forget it!_

_Spit it out, Mental Patient!_

Lyle snorted. Yeah, right. _Who cares if I knew Kyle at all, or not? I knew of him. Isn't that enough? Maybe I was _in love_ with him!_

Angelo cracked up, drawing a very strange look from a group of women sitting a table over. Um, what was his problem-O? _I don't think so..._

_It's true. He reminded me of Jimmy. My darling Jimmy, sadly departed._

_Freaky._

_Oops, did I mentally _scar_ you for _life_?_ He giggled, without actually doing so._ My bad!_

_And you call me 'mean'._

_Yeah, because you _are_! I'm joking. Of course I'm gonna call you 'mean', if I am myself. Hel-lo! Denial!_ He smiled. _Which rhymes with Lyle! Suddenly, I like my name even more! So... cute!_

_Yo, you, rhymes with Kyle, too._

_What you sayin' 'bout my sweetpea, huh?_

_Sweetpea?_

_What?_

_You do realise that was totally Sydney. "What?" Huh? It wasn't me. Was it? No. Shit no! Must have been Parker. She's the gutsy one. Or that loony brother of hers! The pair of them, even better!_

_You picking on my Sydney now!_

_Ew, ménage._

_What? _Lyle's eyes widened in horror. _Traumatised! Must evacuate table - seek... distraction!_ He stood up quickly and hurried over to Parker, who'd just walked into the dining hall. "Hide me!"

She pulled a face. "Hide yourself, freak! Down a deep, dark hole! Preferably! Buuuut... a Dumpster will do fine, too."

Lyle shot a glance in Angelo's direction. "He's evil," he confided. "He scared me."

"I'll bet!" she replied, with a grin.

Lyle frowned and walked back over to Angelo and sat down next to him. "Why can't I call him 'my Sydney'? We work together, on the same team? Why, then?"

_Did I... say you couldn't?_

_No, but you were thinking it!_

_No. I was thinking... m-_

Lyle started humming loudly.

_A person can't even think around you, now?_

_That's not how it is at all!_

_Okay, I'll fix it. Picture this: Sydney, Michelle... and Cooper._

"Help me! Somebody! A maniac is holding me hostage with his mind!"

Broots appeared at their table. "So, what are we all talking about?"

"Threesomes... unfortunately..." Lyle told him sadly.

"Uh-huh? Why is this unfortunate? Pookie not feeling well today?"

Lyle made a face and slapped himself. It was a dream! It was a dream! It had to be a dream!

Broots grinned. "Done and dusted, baby!" He shrugged. "What? It was my dare. It _was_!" His eyes settled on Angelo.

"You!"

He glanced back at Lyle. "What?"

"Ange ain't in the Ring, you can't dare him. Plus, I'd never let him in: he's retarded!"

"You're a fuckin' asshole."

"But you love me anyway."

"No."

"Who are you anyway, hey?"

Broots glared at him and looked back to Angelo. "Do you wanna be in the Dare Ring, Angelo? You get to dare other people stuff. It's cool!"

"Never gonna happen," Lyle interrupted.

"Butt out, weirdo!"

"Bitch!"

"Asshole!"

"You're so mean."

"I know! That's why you love me."

"Shut up. I do not. I love Kyle."

Broots choked, and stared at him. "Say again?"

"I finally figured it out."

"Nuh-ah. It's... Aliens! It's because of... the aliens!"

"BS. It is not. Not even the aliens can pull that shit."

"Yeah they can. Mood control. Like that!" He snapped his fingers. "Besides, you already have it in for the Tower. It wouldn't be a hard bargain to run, if you think about it. All they have to do is mention one of your numerous stuff-ups, for instance, Kyle, and... Bam! You lose it!"

"I'm always losing it. I was probably born with it lost."

"With what lost?"

"Who knows?"

"You weirdo! You are not in love with Kyle."

"Dude, Pretender. I can too be, if I want to!"

"Dude, Em-path!"

"Even better, baby!"

"You're gross!"

"Yeah, but you love me. In a non-sexual way!"

"Oh God! Parker! Quick, quick! Heart failure imminent! Revival team needed, stat!"

"I know First Aid, you know," Lyle offered, with a smile.

"Tell that to Kyle, you freak!" Broots snapped, leaping away from the two Empaths. "See what he does to you, then!"

"He's a rotting corpse someplace. He's not likely to do much, Broots."

"Zombies are real, weirdo!" Broots replied, as he was leaving in a hurry.

"OI!" Parker yelled loudly, snapping Lyle awake. "What are you doin'? Sleeping on the job, El Bludger-O?"

He made a face. "You, horrible woman. Interrupting people when they're having a good dream."

"Oh rubbish! You were not! You never have good dreams. They're always-"

"Homicidal, blah blah blah..."

"Exactly my point."

He sighed. "Anyway, I'm glad you got my attention just now, cos-"

She threw him a dirty glare. Yeah, he could smile! Until she wiped it off his face with her fist! "Shut up!"

He looked at her suddenly, and she realised he'd been staring at Sydney and not her. Wow, strange. He frowned, waiting for her to go on.

"Leave Gramps alone. He's reading, can't you see?"

"Yes, and that's why I wanted to talk to him. About what he's reading."

"You read that crappy journal?" she asked. So freaky.

"Yeah."

She huffed. "Same! Gaw! It's a disease! Why do we do this to ourselves! It's not like it's gonna help us _get_ Sydney anymore than we already _don't_."

Lyle quickly tucked away the _Um, freaked out right now_ expression at Parker's "we", and smiled. "That's not why, Sis. You _know_ why! Cos Sydney's way too composed, and it's so funny winding him up. Hello, my friend, are you still with us? On Earth?" He laughed.

"Five-year-old," Parker replied, unimpressed.

"Totally, girlfriend, totally!"

"Call me that again and I'll kill you," she snapped, in that same flat, unimpressed tone.

"Cool! Gotta run, babe!" He stood up and walked over to Sydney.

"Get lost."

Lyle frowned. Direct. "Who? Me?"

"No, the idiot standing next to you!"

_There's no-one standing next to me_, Lyle thought. _Oh, right, _I_'m the idiot!_ "I am totally insulted right now, you do realise."

"Oh, sure, sure. Be totally insulted as much as you like - away from me!"

"Are you getting out of the house? Is that it? Not enough sunlight? Have you been eating enough? And not always the same-old-same-old? That's not like you. You're not usually..."

"Just get lost, will you!"

Lyle wandered back over to his chair, where Parker was sitting close by, trying not to crack up. "Sydney's sick," he reported.

"Rubbish," Parker replied. "He's just sick of you! Of your _shit_!"

"But I'm adorable!"

"No, you're fuckin' not! Far from, I'm afraid, lovey!" She grinned. "So, what's up with Pa? Heard he got outta town for a couple o' days? What's that about, you think? Hookers? Swingers?"

"I don't think he's the fishing type," Lyle said miserably.

"_Wi_-men!" Parker spelled out for him. Christ, he was being dull! On purpose, of course. Of course.

"No, no, it wasn't a woman he was looking for. It was a man."

"_Oh!_"

Lyle sighed. "No idea who. I hate having crappy dreams. They make me... funny, afterwards."

"You were born funny, Charming."

"No I wasn't," he replied. Then added, darkly, "And I'm not charming."

"Don't I know it!" She rolled her eyes. "Joke, bubba. Joke."

"Enough with the cutesy endearing crap, Parker!"

"You do it to me."

"There's a difference!"

"There is no difference."

"Yeah, I'm mad. You're not. And if you are, a tiny little bit, who cares anyway. You know it. You can work on it. You're not like me. I'm... the sort of person who Sydney would rather just get lost, drop off the face of the planet. That's me. So give it a rest with the nicknames. You're not like me. You're a _real_ person. A good one, I mean. You're gonna... you're gonna do something someday. Something good. A couple o' people, at least, are gonna look at you and say, 'She's a good person, you know. We never knew before, either, but she is. She didn't need us there, holding her hand, because she knew what she wanted to be herself. And she didn't wanna be an asshole like the rest of them.' That's you, that's not me. Don't... do that. Don't talk like I do. I'm a bad influence. I don't know why you'd want to... to even remotely associate yourself with me. You shouldn't. It's fucked-up. And it pisses me off. So don't."

Parker shrugged. "That's what you wanna think, loony. I'm a good person. I'm not like you. I won't pull out my gun, one day, and blow your brains out when you're looking the other way. I'm not that kind of person."

"You think killing is that hard, that it's such an ordeal? If it was, just you trust me, then people wouldn't constantly be killing each other; they wouldn't constantly be starting wars and skirmishes and all of that shit. They'd say, 'Let's sit down and talk about this, see what our options are. How we can work around this without resorting to lethal force.' Underneath, people are just animals, like the rest of them on this planet, and killing's not that hard if they give themselves a reasonably plausible motivation. Right or not, that's all they need. They are animals! But we don't have to be stupid animals. Some of us, unfortunately, are incurably stupid. Stupid because we want to be, not because we are, but because we like the _excuse_ it gives us. But we're not all like that, not all of us. And you aren't either."

"No, but you are. And you don't know what you're on about, either," she replied, with a sigh, and stood up. "Time to go find somewhere else to sit! Stupidness could be catching! Ew!" _Fuck him! Fuck him and his "great fucking insight"!_ she thought angrily. He was a fuckin' bastard and he didn't know Squat from Diddly!

She got up and went to sit with Sydney, who didn't tell her to "get lost" but didn't say anything else to her, either. At least he wasn't clap-trapping on about nonsense, she thought thankfully.

Lyle started humming _I Will Come To You_ absently and Parker glared at nothing in particular. Didn't the creep _get_ it? Any time he opened his stupid trap she felt like shooting him! Dead! Which included humming. She refrained from putting her hands up over her ears. She could take it. She could take it.

She closed eyes.

"You do realise that's bloody morbid," Broots cut in.

Parker nearly snorted.

Lyle hummed _I Only Want To Be With You_, instead.

Broots laughed. "Bobby sung that for the school concert once, didn't he?"

That shut Lyle up. "I know no such person," he said flatly.

"Um, yeah..." A smile came into his voice: "_...Believe me, honey, I just wanna be beside you everywhere. As long as we're together, honey, I don't care..._" He snickered. "Ah, sorry, I don't know any Spanish." He snickered again. "So... Plum's mom, hey? How come the two of you never got together, you know, for keeps? Not really your type, eh."

"Not at all," Lyle replied coldly. "As you know. I prefer the soft, weak ones; the ones who'll look to you for direction. My life... in your hands... They're so... pathetic. They _deserve_ to be broken! Spanish Eyes wasn't like that: she'd have put the law down with me, if I'd tried that shit on her. No thank you."

"Ah, restorative justice," Broots surmised. "Couldn't stand to see those girls living their lives; couldn't let them slip by. Daddy hadn't let you live your life: why should you let them?"

"Absolutely!"

"You do realise how clichéd that is? You're not that clichéd, are you? Somehow, I'd always thought you had more originality than that."

"Nobody is original, when it comes down to it," Lyle replied. "_M'ap kenbe._"

"Yeah, well..."

"_Bay kou, bliye. Pote mak, sonje._"

"If you say so..."

Lyle winked at him. Sure, he did... "_Dèyè mòn gen mòn._"

"_Eske ou ka pale angle?_" Sydney snapped, annoyed, withou taking his attention from the journal in his hands.

"_M pal pi mal_."

Sydney shook his head and said nothing more. Why bother?

Lyle laughed. "_De nada!_"

"Um, can we stop talking Ancient North Martian now?" Broots asked, earning a frown from Lyle.

"Spanish, _amigo_!_ ¿Entiende usted? ¿Español? ¿Sí? Bueno,_ yes?"

"I don't speak Spanish," Broots told him.

"_Poco._"

"No. I'm not mad. I just don't speak it."

Parker sighed. Didn't that just prove it? The guy couldn't tell the difference between _loco_ and _poco_. Still, she didn't feel the need to jump to Lyle's aid. Let the sharks have him. _De nada._

She glanced behind her to see Broots scowling. Lyle deserved it, frankly. But Broots didn't. She contemplated correcting him on his mistake, then changed her mind. No. Best not.

Lyle shook his head and began humming _Put A Little Love In Your Heart_.

"I'm not mad," Broots repeated.

"_Sí_."

"I'm not mad."

"_Entiendo._"

"What did you say?"

"I get it," Lyle replied, in English.

"I don't think you do."

"Oh, of course I do!"

"No. I don't think you do."

"Fine. Your thoughts are your own."

Broots laughed sarcastically.

"_I don't need the world_," Lyle replied.

"I wouldn't buy that."

"Your choice. Perhaps you would, perhaps you wouldn't? _Ahwaak. _Who knows?"

"Would you give it a rest?"

"Aye, Captain!"

Broots narrowed his eyes in a scowl, unimpressed.

"..._All the things that I have known..._" Lyle hummed some other song, Melanie's _The Saddest Thing_, not that Broots knew it. "..._'Thank you, life, for having been'..._"

Parker swallowed a sigh.

"I'll give it a rest," Lyle told Broots, finally, plainly.

"_Ahwaak_," Sydney muttered, more to himself than anyone else, than to Lyle.

.

Down on the ground, later, Parker quietly asked Sydney, "_Ahwaak?_ What does that mean? What language is that?"

"Arabic. _Perhaps_."

"You don't know what it means?"

"It's Arabic," Sydney rephrased. "It means _perhaps_."

Parker nodded. "Ah, _sí_!"

Sydney sighed.

"So how do you know Arabic, or... or what... whatever it was Lyle was speaking earlier?"

"Creole. They were Creole proverbs."

"Right." She sighed heavily. "Guy's gotta get back to his doctor. Get him some new pills, start a-poppin'!"

"Pills are not the answer, Parker," Sydney imparted.

"For Spastic, they are!"

"Not necessarily."

She shrugged. "I think so."

"Well, yes, you've not worked in the industry I have for as many years as I; you've not seen the things that pharmaceuticals can do, on a bad day. Mind you, I say 'a bad day'... A touch of black humour, I think."

Parker sighed again. "I know what you're getting at, but... he's Lyle! Do we really give a rat's ass?"

"You mayn't, Parker - that's entirely up to you - but I, on the other hand, have an obligation to give 'a rat's...' as you say."

"Because of the profession, or wh... what?"

"Pardon me for phrasing it as such, but, no, not because of the profession - because I'm a human being, I am a part of humanity."

"Okey."

"My intention was not to offend you."

She smiled. "_Je sais._"

"_Merci._"

Some time later, she asked, "So, what do you think Raines was doing out of town? Taking a little excursion, respite? Or something else. Something typically William Raines-ish?"

"The name really doesn't suit him, you know. William."

"'Guardian'? No. You're right. It stinks for him. He's not a William at all. But then, neither is- was Lyle a Robert. 'Brilliant'? You've got to be stinkin' kiddin' me!" She laughed. She glanced at Sydney. "Hey, Syd..."

"Mmm? I'm listening."

"I'm glad. I'm glad you listen. Thank you... for listening."

"Not at all." He smiled.

She smiled back. She _was_ glad.

.

Lyle glanced at Broots; they'd been told to check out the back rooms together. "You. You know, I don't think you're mad. You're a funny guy."

"Ha-ha!" Broots intoned unenthusiastically.

"I'm just an idiot sometimes."

"I'll believe that." He snorted, shook his head. "Fuck! Why do I even care what you think? _You are_ mad!"

"They're some acute observation skills you have there, my friend." Lyle grinned. "Joking. I'm joking. See, you _are_ funny! Smiling! Crazy person - smiling!"

"Non-crazy person, not smiling," Broots added. "Non-crazy person looking for Jarod."

"Sounds crazy enough to me. You've got to wonder... If someone wants to be found, is it such a good idea to go looking for them? Sure, some people. But someone like Jarod? He can be... a bit touchy, you know."

"Speaking."

"I _know_! Not a good idea. Me, him, in the same room. Bound to end in one of us starting a tussle. And you know I looove them!"

"Do you?" Broots asked.

Lyle smiled. "Yeh!"

"You sure like to talk."

"Yeh!"

"Haven't you ever heard the phrase 'show, don't tell'?"

"Sure, sure."

"Overcompensating much?"

"Meaning?"

"You're always talking. You never shut up! Don't you get it! You don't talk about this shit! You don't spread it! It's called _incriminating_!"

Lyle smiled. "I am, ah, a bit... you know, criminal."

"Yeah."

"Just so as we're clear, son."

"Are you forgetting that I'm older than you?"

"No way!"

"Way," Broots replied.

Lyle laughed. "I knew that."

Broots shook his head.

"Well then, I could call you..."

Broots closed his eyes. Why were they even having this conversation? It was Lyle, dodging the real issue. Typical Lyle. He was ten times worse than Raines. People just didn't call Raines out on all of his 'incriminating' shit. Never thought, oh maybe it's just that bit incriminating, that bit convenient. And, by rights, he had no cause to be calling Lyle out. Nobody cared. Not even Lyle himself, it seemed.

"Whatcha thinkin', bro? What's goin' through that head o' yours now?"

Broots huffed. "Neither am I your brother," he said.

"But it's cool, right? We're cool?"

"Ah, no. You're still a sick son-of-a-... You're still fuckin' insane, man!"

"Sure am, toots!"

"No, you can't call me that."

Lyle frowned. "Boo."

"Yeah, tough."

"I think I shall call you..."

"McGee. If you must. I'll even tolerate McGeek."

"Not a big McDonald's fan, I gotta say. Gotta stay away from those fries, sorry to say."

"_NCIS_."

"Not a big Navy fan, either, in honesty. But ships? Ships! I can work with- Say, what about them babes! They've got them some hot babes in the Navy, right."

"I guess."

Lyle stared at the window blankly. "Awful choice. Awful."

Broots squinted at the window where the sun was slowly going down, the day growing golden and bronze outside. He thought it a rather pretty view, actually.

Lyle walked over to the window, put his hand on the glass. Quietly, he said, "_...The loudest cry, under the sun above, is the silent 'goodbye' from the ones you love... I'm sorry_. You put me to shame, darlin'. I'm so sorry."

"Leave that," Broots said.

Lyle turned swiftly, upset, for a moment. He'd have to say 'that'! That wasn't that - that had been _someone_ once!

"She's gone," Broots told him, just guessing that it had been a she, that she'd been a female.

"It isn't right," Lyle said, and walked out, glaring glumly at the floor. Stupid, stupid. It would pass. Just needed time.

Parker got in his way, in the hall. "Where are you going?"

"Out."

"No." She grabbed his arm.

He stepped back sharply, pulling his arm from her grip. "I will be back. Now step aside."

"You're up to something!" she spat, getting up in his face, eyes dark.

He put his hands on her arms, pushed her to arm's length.

She grinned manically. Oh, but it was _okay_ when _he_ felt like it!

"_You_ do not dare to tell _me_ what to do, woman! _I am not Angelo!_ You cannot push me around at your fickle whim!" On her arms, his fingernails had turned dark, claw-like; a hint of things to come.

"Whatcha gonna do, Reaper?" she breathed, excitement dancing in her eyes. She'd been wanting to kick some asshole Reaper's ass for forever. Suddenly, it was hard not to lick her lips: she was hungry for the fight.

"Forget it!" Lyle scowled, and let go of her arms, turning quickly and stalking away, back the way he'd come.

Broots, standing in the doorway, was frowning. "Looks like he's long gone, Miss P.," he volunteered.

Parker, fuming, chest heaving, threw crystal daggers his way. "Get back to work!" she snapped angrily, and disappeared the way she'd come.

"I don't play into stupid girls' games," Lyle hissed darkly, on his way past Broots, back into the room.

"No," Broots added quietly, in quiet reproach - I know very well how _you_ work, boy! - "that's no fun at all." He turned back to the room, joined Lyle inside. "What was her name?" he asked.

"Eugenie," Lyle replied, in a low voice, with uncharacteristic lack of hesitation, never turning away from the window to address the man he was speaking to.

"Hey? Pills aren't working, hey?"

Lyle didn't deign him with an answer.

"Lyle?"

The other man spun around quickly, his expression dark. "I'm an Empath!" he scowled, in disgust. "Would you take a pill if it stopped you from being able to speak? No - you wouldn't! _This is what I am!_ It is not a disease!"

Broots frowned, taken aback, just a bit unsettled. The uneasiness was growing. "You've got me wrong," he tried.

Lyle glared at the floor, abruptly. "No doubt," he breathed.

"Of course, I wouldn't expect you to..." He sighed. "But don't you... to... to keep it under control. It's... it's supposed to be a gift, after all, n-not a curse."

"It is what it is," Lyle said. "And I can manage it fine."

"Of course. Just... not so much lately."

Lyle scowled. "Butt out of it, if you know what's good for you, tech!"

"I... I'm your friend," Broots forced out, meeting his eyes.

Lyle smiled, showing sharp teeth. "Of course," he said.

"I... I really don't like it when you... do that," Broots told him. "It makes me... frankly, _very uncomfortable!_"

"It helps to screen the Empathy," Lyle replied simply, and turned away from him. They had things to do, clues to seek out and decipher, a Pretender to find.

Nonetheless, he put the teeth away.

Not that Broots, who'd left the room, noticed.

Eugenie, once a slightly plain but still beautiful (to empathetic eyes) young woman, sat in the corner, staring at her bare feet with a look of hopelessness, a look of empty longing, for what it was she was longing for, she didn't know: this empty hollow inside her didn't yet have a name. Perhaps it never would. Perhaps she would act before then...

"You make me so sad, my dear. Oh, so terribly sad. One tends to believe, even in the bleakest landscape, that there will always come another option, another Plan B, another choice; a bright light, warmth. But I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Your light came too late, didn't it, darling? Your little ray of warmth was cold when it touched upon your face. There was no life left in you then, no will. I'm sorry you saw the world that way. Eugenie."

Eugenie, pale face, small, pale feet, lifted her gaze from the floor, momentarily. There was a shine in her eyes, life in there still.

Quietly, Lyle sung _I Only Want To Be With You_. I remember, Eugenie. I remember that, for a moment, you shone. You shone, oh so brightly! You held hope. You were hope. You were alive! That doesn't end, darling. Life doesn't end. Somehow, someway, it goes on. Darkness would be incomprehensible without light. And the light returns, with the rising sun. Each morning, the light returns. Don't you give up, Eugenie. Don't you give up! You're not alone, not anymore. I remember you! Oh, I remember! And you were great!

He smiled, turned to Eugenie suddenly. Hummed the start of _Put A Little Love In Your Heart_. "Come on, darlin'! You've gotta know this one!" He sung along to the song playing in his memory, smiling.

Eugenie sighed and glanced at the window, at the approaching night, apprehensive. Didn't the sight just put a spark of gladness in her heart! Another night, alone. Another night, wasted. Pointless.

"Nobody is pointless, darlin'. No life is pointless, a waste. We are all precious. Life is precious. But nobody's blaming you, hon. Nobody's angry at you. But just remember, easy isn't always fulfilling. Life may mean suffering, but that might be a generalisation, a misinterpretation of a overly pessimistic mind, a damaged psyche. Who doesn't love a happy ending! And we go on looking: we always go on looking! And that's... it's great, Eugenie. In this world, you are your greatest hope, your greatest friend. If you can't reach you, then nobody can. Just you keep looking, sweetheart. Keep looking for that happy ending. You know what they say, the ending is just the beginning. Keep those brilliant eyes peeled, darlin'. Just you keep hoping! When you least expect it- Bam! Everything will turn around! The sun will come out, in your heart! You'll finally feel that warmth. Finally, it will all have been worthwhile. Everything that came before, all of it, the suffering, too, will have been worthwhile; the journey to here will have been worthwhile, will suddenly become meaningful.

"The sun will find a way into the darkness, the warmth into the cold, or how would we ever know them apart, how would we ever know they existed at all? Loss is always a prelude to better things, Eugenie. There is a point - always a point - where you come to the bottom, and the only way left, is up, the only thing to do, is to laugh, not cry: no more tears, baby. No more tears, no longer will you cry. It's not always wrong to hold on. Hold onto the good things, Eugenie, don't bid them farewell. They'll come around again; you'll see them again, in the most unlikely places. Oh, I know you know so!

"Just remember, you're not a bad person, Eugenie. You're not condemned, for one mistake, for two. We'd still take you back again. So where you at, girl?"

.

A clue from Jarod had led them to a factory manufacturing plastic products. It wasn't a fun place. And then they had been off again, to a forest reserve. Alongside the forest lay a plantation; the forest there had been levelled almost to the ground.

"Thank you."

Broots frowned, then turned to Parker. "There's no-one here, Miss Parker."

"I can see that, thank you!" she snapped. "Scout out the place. Better to be sure than sorry." With that, she headed off, further into the forest, further along the track that had been made there.

"I'm sorry, what were you thanking me for?" Broots asked, when she'd gone, now glancing Lyle's way, but he was still watching the plantation. Broots frowned. _Oh, I see_, he thought. He hadn't been thanking him at all. Bobby had lived by a forest; he'd been thanking the trees. _Oh, how strange._ He sighed.

A forestry's car pulled up, further up the track, and Parker turned and walked back toward them for a chat, brushing dust blown up by the car from her skirt. Nice, real nice.

Broots glanced around quickly, but Lyle had already gone. Off, toward Parker.

He'd planted himself in front of Parker, between her and the man who'd exited the vehicle. "Back off! You won't lay a single finger on her! Get behind me, Princess! They are enemies!"

Parker scowled in irritation, shoved him aside with a hand. "You're insane!" she snapped, and crossed her arms, sizing up the man before her. "Jarod left something with you. I am Miss Parker. I believe that will be for me."

The man smiled. "Not quite," he said.

"Miss Parker!" Broots shouted, but it was too late. The man already had the gun aimed on her. Sydney lowered his own gun. Damn! Where was Jarod when they needed him? Surely he'd not been the one to set this trap up? He glanced at Lyle, but he wasn't in any fit state to defend Parker. He saw, then, the young woman - just a teenager, really - sitting on the back seat, smiling softly. Ah, another Empath.

Lyle's teeth sharpened and he lifted his face from the ground, forced himself to smile. He stood up, blue eyes brown. "You will not shoot," he growled in a deep voice. "You may kill her, but then I will kill you. I will kill all of you!"

"A Reaper," the man commented, with a grin in his voice. "We'd heard that that one was an Empath. A pleasant surprise, I must say." He pointed his gun at Lyle.

Lyle leapt at him, and fell to the ground.

"Thought so," the man replied. "Primarily an Empath. That's not a real Reaper - it's _pathetic_!"

"Are you an idiot?" Parker growled, dark anger burning in her eyes. "You shot a Parker! The Centre's going to come after you, and they won't stop until they've had their revenge! You idiots!"

The man laughed. "You are the idiot, Miss Parker. You're the idiot, for believing that the Centre could care less what happens to that disgusting creature." He grinned again. "Now, kindly don't put up a struggle, and come with us."

"I'm not leaving my brother!" she scowled.

"Except, that isn't your brother," the man told her. "Merely an imposter. Another of Raines's manipulations. That old man is a pain-in-the-ass. No matter how badly he screws up, he goes on believing that he can fool the Tower, that he can win back their favour whilst deceiving them still." He laughed. "That one's one of his, isn't it?"

Parker said nothing, face set.

"Yes, that's right," Sydney answered, because Parker wasn't about to. He didn't want to see her hurt for her sheer obstinacy.

The man sighed. "Still, thing's a Reaper. Better to be safe than sorry." He pointed his gun, shot again. One, two, three times.

The young woman on the backseat smiled wider.

"You needn't have wasted your ammunition," Parker stated plainly. "The Reaper cannot Heal himself. There's too much Empath in him."

"We like to do things right," the man replied, gestured to the car. "Now, if you'll please, Miss Parker; we're waiting."

She glanced at Sydney. _Don't do anything. Let them take me, okay. Then call the company. Let them know what's happened. But don't risk your own life._ Then she got into the back of the car, with the smiling young woman.

As the car drove away, Broots joined Sydney, looking in a daze. He glanced down at Lyle. Not much of a Reaper, really. The man had been right, whoever he was, whoever he worked for. And now they'd lost Parker, and Lyle might have been dead.

Sydney put his gun away. It was of no use now.

Broots didn't dare check to make sure if Lyle was alive or dead. If he was, by some stroke of luck, still alive, he might have reacted badly to someone trying to help, his Reaper-side might become suddenly violent. And if he was dead, his Empathy could be unstable, could harm anyone who touched him.

"My cell phone's not working," Sydney reported, glancing down at his phone with a frown. Some sort of magnetic wiping device, perhaps?

Broots got out his phone, frowned, too. "Uck! Too much! Mine's down, too!"

Sydney sighed. After a minute or two, he frowned again. Perhaps we should try Lyle's phone, he thought.

Broots was at the car. He looked up, face stricken. "It won't start!"

"No, I don't imagine it will," Sydney breathed, getting down and feeling for Lyle's pulse at his neck. Nothing. He found his cell phone, glanced down at it. It seemed to be working, but just barely. The screen flickered intermittently, the light behind the screen weak. A little heart bleeped on and off, on the screen. It was monitoring his heartbeat, Sydney thought, with a frown. He looked for the Address Book, for Raines's number. Skipped over Courtland's, the Chairman's. No, not Brown. Pressed the button to Call.

"William Raines," came the reply.

"This is Sydney," Sydney relayed hurriedly. "Someone's taken Parker. I think it was a rival. We need assistance. We've got to get her back, before they do something to her."

"I see. You mind putting my minion on, for a moment?"

"I don't think that's going to work; the enemy put him out of action."

"What's that supposed to mean, Sydney?" Raines asked, in irritation.

"I think he's dead," Sydney finally said.

Raines laughed. "That's absurd! He's a Reaper, Sydney!"

"Even Reapers aren't so indestructible as to survive a bullet in the heart. Or three. Vital organs are as vital to Reapers are they are to anyone."

Raines scowled. "Nonsense! LYLE! WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING AT? WHY ARE YOU MAKING SYDNEY SAY THESE IDIOTIC THINGS! COME TO THE DAMN PHONE, BOY!"

Sydney held the phone away from him sharply. "William, he's dead."

Raines laughed. "I brought that child back from the dead, Sydney! He... is... not... _dead_... until I say he can be! Put him on the phone!"

Broots returned from the car, fretful. "Is that the Chairman? Did you get through?"

"Raines," Sydney replied shortly. "Raines, inform Brown. We'll need Reagan. We need a working Empath." He relayed their location.

"Courtland will have a team sent from the closest available branch," Raines told him. "Damn Bama! That's all we need: Barb Loginov and her incompetent lot!"

"Calm down," Sydney replied. "Now is not the time for panic. We need to remain level-headed here, William. We still don't know who took Miss Parker, or why."

"Isn't it obvious?" Raines growled. "They took her because she's a Pretender!" He hung up.

Sydney sighed, turned his glance to Broots's. "Well, that's that. We'll see what happens, from now."

Half an hour later, they were joined by a contingency from the Alabama branch, Barb Loginov included. And someone else, someone Sydney had thought he'd never see again, someone who didn't bring a smile to his face.

Alex knelt down on the ground, turned Lyle over, brushed a smudge of dust from his cheek. "Barbara, bring the Healer. This one's close to the edge. We'll need the information he may be able to provide on those who took the Parker woman." He hummed Kasey Chambers's _Bring Back My Heart_.

"His Empathy's too unstable," Sydney spoke up, meeting first Alex's eye, then Barb's. "He can't be Healed. Tower's orders." He made a face at Alex. He was dead; what was the idiot talking about?

Alex patted Lyle's face. "Empath," he ordered, "we need you. Report!" He closed his eyes. "The Empath says that it was Tower Twenty-nine."

Barb swore. "Sorry, Green, but we can't fight the bosses. If they want the woman, we're not inclined to oppose them. What they want, they get."

"You liar!" Sydney hissed, in Alex's direction. "He's dead! He told you no such thing!"

Barb walked to Alex's side, glared down at him with hard eyes. "You had better not have been lying to Dr. Green!" she spat. "To _me_, Alexis!"

"Not at all," he replied pleasantly, taking his hand from Lyle's cheek. The skin was red, blistered and angry. As he stood, more blisters appeared on his face. "The Empath has an idea. We need to move out." He glanced at Barb.

She sighed heavily. "Go."

Sydney scowled in anger. Barb was an even bigger fool than he'd imagined, to believe a psychopath she'd somehow had brought back from the dead, let alone to believe a dead sociopath.

"Bring the corpse!" Barb ordered her men, and walked off, for her black Jeep.

In the car, Broots frowned at him, upset. "Why did you say that, Syd? Why did you say that they shouldn't Heal Lyle?"

"I merely relayed what I was told by his doctor," Sydney replied simply.

"_...And if you see someone tearing me apart, just tell her to bring back my heart..._"

Sydney shot Alex a dirty look. _Alexis_, he thought, with a silent snigger. So, once again, Barb had made Alex her little bitch. What was new? Perhaps he'd imagined that something might have changed, because she'd brought him back, but, really, nothing had. That was just desserts, he supposed. Alex could act as smug as he liked, he was still just a pawn, like the rest of them.

On the backseat, the woman sitting beside Broots smiled. She clicked along to the song Alex was humming.

Sydney had the indescribable urge to ask her exactly what kind of funny pills she was on. So Alex had picked himself up a fan. How disgusting! It would backfire, in the end, he reassured himself. In the end, she'd wake up to his true nature, and then she'd turn faster than the wind on a stormy afternoon.

.

A typical interrogation room, Parker surmised. Typical Tower lackey. Black suit, black tie, black shoes, black shades, white Tower pin.

"We've reason to believe your twin lives," the Tower lackey told her, unemotionally.

"My, he must be good. To still be breathing after your pals popped him with three little friends right through the heart. 'Atta boy!"

"Theodore Elroy Parker," the man said, with no change to his tone.

Parker didn't let her surprise show, but she was sure, now, that they were referring to her real twin. So, she'd been right all along; Lyle had only ever been an imposter. Her real twin could still be out there - _was_ still out there! Her _twin_!

"We're going to need your assistance in tracking him down, Melody. We hope you'll offer us your full co-operation in this matter, but if you feel some hesitation, never you mind, we have our own techniques to convince those who are reluctant and doubtful."

.

They'd come to an airfield and were now given a chance to stretch their legs, out of the car. Sydney and Broots got out, and watched the woman who'd been sitting with them leap out of the car. She walked over to Alex, stopped by his side. Quietly, she said something to him that they couldn't catch.

"I am fine, Jolene," he replied, and she nodded, accepting his words. "How are you?"

"Fine, thank you, Alex."

"Very well."

"Jolene!" Barb snapped, and the woman strode in her direction.

"Ma'am?"

.

"They won't dare harm you, you know," a teenaged boy spoke up, leant against the wall of the interrogation room, a smile on his face.

"Why's that, Bobby?" Parker asked.

"At least, not whilst we're up in the air," Bobby added. "Catherine demonstrated adequate ability to interfere with electrical devices. Wouldn't want to risk it, to risk crashing and killing us all. Have to be damn fools."

"We're... flying?" Parker asked.

"Quite."

She frowned. "You're a projection?"

"Something like that," he said, with a smile.

"Will you help me?"

Bobby frowned. "They want Noah."

It was Parker's turn to frown. "That- that's not what they said. They said Theodore."

"Theodore, Noah. Many names."

"Noah _is_ Theodore?"

"Yes. In a sense, Miss Parker, Theodore is Noah."

"Are they right? Is what they're saying true? He's alive? My twin's still alive?"

Bobby smiled.

She only dropped her eyes for a second, but when she looked again, he was gone. She gave a heavy sigh. She really had no cause to trust the boy anymore than she'd ever had any cause to trust Lyle. He might as well have been lying to her, the same as the Tower.

The sound of a door scraping brought her 'round and she realised she'd fallen asleep. She'd been dreaming, only dreaming.

.

_My real twin is a Class Nine Empath_, she thought. _My real twin killed 52 people when he was just four years old; turned their brains to mush with the power of his mind, turned his negative feedback on them and fried them._ So that was why Raines had chosen to replace Theodore with Lyle, another Empath, though of a lesser Class. After all, it was only the African branch who believed that there was such a thing as a Class Nine; most believed the Classing system to go no higher than Seven, though, recently, there'd been talk of extending the scale to Twelve. She wondered how her twin would fare on the scale then, if that were to happen. Would Africa then insist that he'd been a Twelve all along? And just why had he been _so_ special? Yes, he'd got the biomech tech up and running, viable, he'd enabled the work with upgrades to go ahead; he'd taken the first upgrades successfully, without dying a few hours later, he'd been able to interface with the appropriate machines; he'd done all that, but what else had he done that made him quite so special, so famous, as to exist on a par with T-Corp's Nash, their great saviour, their pride and glory?

And what do they want him for, now? she thought. Surely, it would be for nothing good. She wondered if they would look very similar, what sort of a person he was, if he had a good sense of humour, if he'd know her, if they were ever to meet, if he was married, if he had a family, kids? And, as she wondered all of this, her heart hurt. As much as she detested the idea of the Centre getting their hands on her brother, she so wanted to see him, to talk to him, to... to hug him.

The woman who'd come in produced a syringe and injected her, so that her eyes felt heavy, her limbs tired. Just a sedative, she thought. She wouldn't have to wait long until they arrived, she wouldn't have to agonise over the fact that she was virtually helpless, now. Bobby was wrong; she wasn't like Catherine. She couldn't have taken this plane down if she'd wanted to; she'd never been able to fell a single person with her Inner Sense; she'd never done anything like that, not even as Molly, she never had been that person. She could talk, she could kick ass, she could pull a gun and push it in someone's face, hand completely steady, but she wasn't 'witchy', she wasn't how Lyle imagined her to be, how he'd obviously told Bobby she was. She wasn't fantastic, like that. She was just a person. She wasn't even a Pretender, anymore, an Inner Sense Possessor. She was an angry woman with a gun.

She closed her eyes and there was darkness. And then...

The boy.

"You said you'd help me," she said, at once. She was standing in her special room, in the secret room in her mind. She sat down on a comfortable leather couch, happy to be off her feet, to be sitting in a comfy chair instead of that hard, cold chair.

"Yes."

"Bobby?"

"Yes?"

She couldn't shake the feeling this was all some crazy hallucination. Why would Bobby help her? Why would he even care? She'd never met Bobby. He'd never even known about her; she'd never known about him. "Why? Why are you so willing to help me? Is it because of Lyle? Did he tell you you had to? That he'd hurt you, if you didn't?"

"I will do what I can to help you, for those who did the same for me," Bobby replied, "for those who helped me."

She frowned. "Do you mean Raines? Bobby, do you mean... Dr. Billy?"

Bobby smiled.

"How are you going to help me if... if you're only a projection?" Parker asked. "This is the Tower, Bobby. They're trained to be able to resist mind games. You won't be able to just slip through their defences so easily."

"The thought had occurred to me," the boy said.

"Then how're you gonna help, Bobby?"

"I think I have an idea."

"You'll... 'possess' one of them? What then? Can you fight?"

"Of course. I'm an Empath. I know a few things."

Parker sighed. "Bobby, you let your father hurt you."

"In the past. I have no emotional connection to these people, and they none to me. It will not be the same. If they provoke it, I shall not hesitate to react accordingly."

"You're sure you can do that? It's not the same as hurting someone that you're angry at, Bobby. It's not the same as hurting Jimmy, or your father."

Bobby frowned, looking at the floor. "I understand," he said quietly. "Lyle has this ability, and I shall, too."

"That's because Lyle fabricates a connection with those girls, Bobby. He _is_ angry at them."

"Anger is not a requirement," Bobby replied firmly, a little stiffly. "Anger comes from fear. Fear leads to irrational behaviour. No, I do not want that. If I am to operate successfully, at optimal capacity, to disable the opponent as cleanly as possible, anger will not be required. I do not know these people. I have no cause to judge them, as people. I will merely judge them for the face they present, from the point of view as this job requires. I will do my job, as they will do theirs. It is not personal. They must know the risk, must know what they're signing up for, as do I. Are _you_ okay? Will you be up to the mission?"

_The mission._ Bobby was thinking of it as a mission, now. "Yes. I'm okay," she replied, without getting her feelings involved. The kid was kinda... creepy; kinda not how she'd thought Bobby would be. She wasn't so convinced this was Bobby. Maybe it wasn't Bobby, after all. Maybe it was Lyle, or a Tower fabrication?

"If you know how to fight, Bobby, then why did feel the need to take things so far as to kill Jimmy?"

Bobby frowned, thinking this through. "To complete the mission, Jimmy's death was a necessary requirement. If I had not killed Jimmy, I could not have insinuated my own death and framed my father. I could not have had him sent to jail. If I'd simply run away from home, he might have come after me. He might have hurt my mother, in my place. And even if he hadn't, he'd never have stopped hurting her. The next time she made him angry, he'd have been at it again."

"But you were angry at Jimmy, when you... killed him?" she asked, feeling a shiver go down her spine. This kid was too creepy!

"A momentary, fleeting thing. I could have chosen to let it pass, if I had wanted, but I chose to give into it, to harness it, instead. I would need to kill Jimmy anyway, so why not do it when I felt... I had a reason to."

"Did you have a reason to?"

"An honest reason, Miss Parker?" Bobby asked. "No. I did not. Jimmy would never have hurt me as my father had; Jimmy never would have threatened my life, nor anyone else's, at that time. To kill him, as I did, was wrong. Was a betrayal of not only Jimmy's trust, a betrayal of my friend, but of myself. Before I killed Jimmy, I had not been that kind of person." He sighed. "There is always a glimmer of hope, of redemption, however, but I have long ago chosen not to look for it, to shun it. I have become a disappointing person, I know, but you needn't worry. I am on your side, for now. I will not hurt you."

"Are you fucking insane, Bobby?" Parker asked, unable to hold it back any longer.

"The thought had occurred to me," he replied, and smiled. "But then, that would be the easy option, I suppose. To merely assume myself insane, helpless to this affliction. That would be wrong. I have the ability to look at my actions and judge them for their moral credibility, and so, therefore, I have decided that I mustn't be so mad as to be metaphorically blameless for my actions."

Parker stood up and decided that it was time for action. If she wanted to know if Bobby could fight, she'd have to take him on herself and see what happened. He _had_ said that he would not hurt her, but he'd also said that anyone who was to become his opponent would automatically be put in his line of fire. Suppressing a sigh, she decided that there was nothing for it. When she woke up, she would need all the help she could get. It wouldn't be wise to remain in the Tower's hands too long, lest they got restless with her efforts to recover Noah and decided to put her to use on some other project they'd suddenly dreamed up.

"If you ask me," she imparted, "you come over as a tad robotic for a real boy."

"Yes, I have noticed that, also."

Not the effect she'd been going for, she thought, with some irritation. Damn! Even if he _did_ look a lot like Lyle, she still felt some reluctance in attacking him, out of the blue. She sighed. "Bobby, do you think we could get in some training, before the real thing?"

"I do not want to hurt you, Miss Parker. It would make fighting harder for you, when the time came."

Parker frowned. "But you won't be hurting me really, Bobby. I'm asleep, remember."

Bobby seemed to consider this. "You doubt my abilities. I see. A wise move, as you have not seen me fight before. I may prove to be a big liability."

"Bobby?"

"Yes, Miss Parker?"

"Do you always phrase things...?" She nodded, in illustration. _As you are now._

"My moods change, as they do with any living being. My phrasing seems to be affected by my mood, among other things."

"Okay."

"Yet, I am an Empath," he conceded. "I think I can work on it, if it... seems awkward to you."

"That'd be great, Bobby," she said. "Alright, let's begin, shall we? You ready?"

"Yes."

.

The boy was passable, she had to admit, but would he be good enough if he couldn't win a single match with her? She wasn't naturally a fighter. Molly had excelled at violence, but Molly and she had integrated personalities long ago. She couldn't manifest Molly any longer. Whatever skills she had now, were the best she was going to get. If she wanted to be better, she'd have to train. She suppressed a sigh. She hardly had the time for that now, did she?

She'd always thought, if they'd gotten into a fight, that Lyle would have easily won. Now, she wasn't so sure. Without a gun, she'd probably have beat him hands-down. But Lyle and Bobby weren't the same, either. Bobby was more like a robot than a boy, and though she'd have been perfectly happy to believe Lyle in the same category as the kid, she also knew otherwise: Lyle wasn't like Bobby at all - hadn't been like Bobby at all - he'd been angry at the whole world, where Bobby, it seemed, didn't know what to make of the world so had constructed a fantasy in which everything was controlled by a hierarchy, that there was no such thing as 'shit happens.'

She planted her hands on her hips and took some thoughtful breaths. "Bobby, I'd really rather prefer if you try. And I don't mean as you are now, I mean really try."

"I am trying," Bobby replied, with a frown.

She didn't spare him any kindness. "Not good enough."

Bobby sighed. "Of course, you are entitled to your opinions, to your own thoughts. I am sorry, however, but if you believe your tactics to pressure me into acting out will work, you are mistaken. I will act as I feel comfortable; I will not allow myself to be taken down a notch by my own mistakes. I have already walked down that path. I must say, I did not find it a particularly favourable sensation. I have to face that side of me every day, but I would not chose to throw myself into that same predicament again. I am not merely some monster."

Parker stared at him. "Oh, will you stop pretending!" she growled.

Bobby sighed. "I won't let you down, Miss Parker," he said, finally. "If I do, you have my permission to get mad, if that is your wish, but please, for the time being, do not accuse me of something that isn't true. I am not playing at anything. In the present circumstance, I do not see that my personality is of utmost importance. The important thing is that we are ready, when the time comes."

She scowled. "Don't you get it, you idiot? After this, there is no more time for you! Lyle is dead! _You're_ dead! Here you are, saying you've got my back, no problems, but I don't believe you! I don't believe you at all."

Bobby laughed. "Oh, you little idiot! You seriously think something like that worries me! That death frightens me! Oh, you funny little thing! You're so adorable! Look here, you, I'm going to get you home and then, whatever happens then, happens. I'll be ready for it. And if I have my doubts, you know what, we all have doubts, and then something unexpected happens. I figure my chances are 50/50. Personally, I'll be hoping for the 'something wonderful,' as opposed to the 'something terrible,' but you never know. You've got to take life as it comes."

"You _are_ insane," Parker told him.

The boy smiled.

"In that case," she snapped, "you think you're such a grown-up, then let me ask you this: If Raines was willing to take you on at the company, why did you have to kill Jimmy? Raines could have organised for the both of you to be taken out-of-state; your father would have had no chance against the might of a big company like the Centre. If you're so insistent on only doing what was necessary, and you're such a genius, then why didn't you think of that? Unless you did, and you didn't care, because you wanted to get back at your dad any way you could, no matter the consequence, no matter who got caught in the crossfire! In reality, you're nothing more than a monster masquerading as a human being! You're lying to me and you're lying to yourself!" She laughed. "What happens now, Bobby? You blame Raines? Is that it?"

Bobby sighed. "We haven't the time for this, Miss Parker. Nobody will be blaming you for my actions, and if they do so, they will be fools. I am in full capacity of my mind. I am fully responsible for my actions myself. Even if no-one else knows it, or believes it, you, Miss Parker, just remember it. My actions were my own. You were not responsible for stuff-ups. I may be a monster, but it's up to you to choose what you are. You don't become a monster by mere association; you become a monster by inaction, by choosing not to be something else. You are much to wilful for that to fall prey to that affliction."

"You just think you know me _so_ well!" she spat.

Bobby sighed. "Time for you to rest. You'll be arriving soon."

Parker smiled. "I don't think I want to leave so soon. I think I want to find out their plans for my brother, first. What have you go to say to that, C3PO?"

Bobby frowned. "C-3-P-O?"

"You're right, you're more like a Dalek. Or a Cyberman!"

"You do realise you might as well have been talking gibberish for all the sense you made just now." He sighed. "Either way, you need your rest. I shall return then." And with that, he walked out the door of her imaginary room, closing the door after him.

"You suck!" Parker spat after him, and sunk down on the sofa. She was alone now.

.

Of course, she knew something of Noah, had recently found out a lot about him, thanks to a conference she'd tagged along with Sydney to see. Noah, Nash, the Mysterious Healer, Jarod: these people were always popular talking points at conferences and seminars. She had to wonder, however, how she fit into all of this. She'd once been Healed by the Mysterious Healer, after all. And Noah was her twin. What was more, Jarod had been her childhood friend. Catherine had been her mother, and people either loved or hated the woman. Really, Parker thought, she was lucky they weren't talking about her more. Or perhaps certain people had been, in fact. She didn't like the sounds of that thought.

She woke to a groggy feeling. It wasn't pleasant. Her vision was slightly blurry, at first, and her throat felt dry. Her eyes stung. For no apparent reason, she started wondering why Lyle's Reaper's eyes had been brown. Though, he'd been able to keep them blue, if he'd wanted, too. He really had had excellent control of his Reaper side. If only he'd been a full Reaper, then he might have been able to deflect those bullets with telekinesis. Then he might have been able to stop her from being taken. This place, wherever it was, was making her highly uncomfortable. She didn't like the feeling one bit, and Bobby still hadn't shown up. For now, she was alone.

She wasn't keen on being alone in this place. When you were alone, anything could happen (in a place like this). When you were alone, you had no-one to grab and shield yourself behind, she thought, should gunfire break out. No-one to talk to so that you'd still remember what your voice sounded like.

She shook the feeling off, realising that it was likely just the displacement she felt, the unfamiliarity of this place, coupled with the dread she felt, and the effects of the drugs she'd been given. She wasn't really lonely. Well, not that lonely; not so lonely as to find a nice corner to curl up in and sulk.

She frowned, struggling into a sitting position. She was in a room that looked much like a hospital room, or one of those down on Med Space, except it was themed in blue, rather than green, as Blue Cove's Med Space was.

She heard something crash heavily into the door, on the other side of the door, and jumped, startled. She couldn't see what it was and she wished she'd had some way of defending herself that didn't just involve her fists and her wits, because she really wasn't feeling her best right now, she had to admit.

Her breath started to shallow out, she fought not to hyperventilate. This place was really getting to her! It pissed her off. She tumbled out of bed, onto her feet. The floor felt hard under her bare feet. She stumbled toward the door, her expression hard, ready to surprise whoever it was who was on the other side of the door when they burst in. It was just lucky she hadn't been hooked up to any machine, she thought, which likely meant she'd been locked in here. That was all about to change: the someone on the other side of the door appeared to be working on opening the door.

She got a good stance and regulated her breathing as best as she could. She was ready.

The door creaked open, then, all of a sudden, someone fell through the door, to the floor. A heavy thud followed.

Parker started at the person on the floor, now struggling to their knees. The boy stood up quickly, unsteadily, looking very pale. Smiled.

"As promised. Here I am."

She frowned.

"You're still sleeping, but I've got some information that might help." Brushing a strand of hair out of his eyes, Bobby walked over and stopped in front of her, reaching over to take her hand.

She flinched - she didn't like him touching her - but she didn't pull her hand back. This was some Empath thing, Empathic sharing of some sort, she supposed. Then he let go of her hand. She didn't feel any different, strangely. She'd thought she might feel _something_, at least, but: nothing.

In the background, a song started playing. _You Don't Have to Say You Love Me_. Dusty Springfield, not Cher.

"Soon, it will be time to wake up," Bobby told her. "Do not be afraid: you are not alone." He smiled. "_It happens to be true._"

_This kid's insane_, she thought. _I'm having real trouble believing it actually possible, but he might even be more insane than Lyle._

.

On the way back to the Centre's Alabama branch, Broots fell asleep in the car. In his dream, Parker was sitting up in what looked like a hospital bed, arms hugging her legs, knees drawn up to her chest. She looked paler than ever. "You sold us out!" she said, without even a hint of accusation in her voice: she knew it to be true already. "I should call you McStupid. McTraitor! Did you really believe them when they told you they wouldn't hurt me? Gullible fool! Take a good look! Look at me, you idiot! Do I look unhurt to you?" And then he saw: the cuts, the bleeding gashes, the dark bruises.

His chest hurt. "I... I'm sorry," he stammered helplessly.

"Silvie will never forgive you for betraying her father, for getting him killed!" Parker hissed now. "She'll leave you and never look back! You'll never know your child - and it's all your own fault!"

"No!"

"Broots?"

Broots shook his head, blinked open his eyes. Sydney was peering at him with worry in his eyes. "I- I'm sorry," he whispered.

Sydney frowned. "There's nothing to be sorry for, Broots. Are you alright?"

_No_, he thought. I'm not okay. _There's plenty to be sorry for._ But he said, "Yes. Of course. Just a bad dream, is all."

Jolene was frowning at him too, but he ignored her. Since finding out that she was Lucy Saxon's American cousin, he'd given up on her: he didn't like her anymore.

"I'm okay," he said, for clarification, though he wondered for who's sake: for Sydney's, or for his own.

Suddenly, he felt like crying. It was true that Lyle had been a bad person, but he'd been Silvie's dad, too, Debbie's friend. In a way, he'd even been his friend. And he, Broots, had been the one who'd sold Parker out to the Tower, who'd made sure that Lyle wouldn't know they were coming by giving him that damn medication the Tower had told him to. If for no other reason, he knew, Silvie would never forgive him for betraying one of her kind, another Empath. If he was damn lucky, she wouldn't spread the word to Debbie. If she did, he was done for. His life would be over! Debbie wouldn't understand that he'd only done what he had to avoid further harm to his friend, Miss Parker. All she'd be able to think about was the fact that he'd gotten someone killed and another - another of her friends - kidnapped by some very, very bad people with every intention to hurt, to maim, on their minds, if it could benefit them in some way.

So, in the end, he was no better than Lyle, he thought. Because Parker deserved better.

.

"Alex?"

"Jolie?"

Jolene leant forward, toward the front seat. She was frowning. She whispered something to Alex, who replied calmly, "Someone is with him. He's carrying some very valuable biotech. A Noah-type upgrade, it seems. Though we're prohibited from offering Healer assistance, he'll be well looked after. In any case, his upgrades will be. If he regains consciousness, someone will know."

Jolene nodded.

"Don't you worry, Jolene, Reapers are hardy."

"He's not a full Reaper," Sydney interrupted, with a scowl, unable to keep from speaking up.

"He's Reaper enough," Alex replied. "The Tower weren't too clever, to be honest. For a start, they obviously didn't get a good look at his medical records as they don't appear to have been aware of the fact that his heart isn't in quite the typical place, as it is, in most cases; it's a little more to the right. They go on about how they're the best, but honestly, they're no better than the rest of us: they're as impatient, as narrow-sighted as any of us. And, for another thing, he's Reaper enough to be able put himself into a state much like stasis or hibernation. If we're lucky, we won't have to lose him. He's still capable of proving a very valuable asset. As a Class Five Empath, and a tech and translator. After all, he speaks the language of T-Corp fluently."

"They... they have their own language?" Broots couldn't help but asking, momentarily allowing himself to forget his guilt in favour of this sudden intrigue.

Sydney sighed. "They do," he replied, with a scowl directed Alex's way. "I suppose you yourself speak the language."

"Yes, I do."

"There you go. There's really no need for Lyle, at all."

Alex frowned, sighed, offered Jolene a small smile, and returned his attention to the front. Well, yes, Sydney was entitled to his personal opinion: that didn't mean, however, that others had to follow that same belief.

"I thought you'd have been pleased," Sydney pushed. "He did _kill_ your 'comrade,' Kyle."

"You've obviously a fairly narrow understanding of high-Class Empaths of fractured upbringings, Dr. Green," was all Alex would say.

Sydney laughed, offended. "You're obviously still as damn full of yourself as you ever were!" he spat.

"Sydney," Jolene interjected sensibly. "Let's not make things more tense than they already are."

"What would _you_ know?" Sydney scowled angrily.

"That is enough!" Alex told him, a sudden hard edge to his voice. "You do not speak to Jolene like that! She has done nothing to wrong you; she does not deserve your foul mood, Sydney. This discussion is over."

"Like Hell it is, psychopath!" Sydney muttered darkly, and crossed his arms. He said no more.

.

"What's wrong with Alex?" Broots asked, when they'd been shown to some suitable quarters and finally left alone. Sydney had sat down on the end of the bed, but Broots remained on his feet. "He's not usually so defensive of other people, let alone... a woman..."

"It's a ruse," Sydney scowled, expression dark. "What else!"

"But, why, do you think? Why Jolene? What's so special about her?"

"She has the Chairwoman's favour, it seems," Sydney replied obviously. "Damn! If anything's happened to Parker, the idiots who took her are going to be sorry! Jarod will not take nicely to this!"

Broots sighed, wiping a palm over his forehead. "I sure hope she's okay." He paced the length of the room once, before saying, "What was that on Alex's hand? Was that negative feedback?"

Sydney nodded silently.

"That's got to mean Lyle's still alive," Broots spoke up, a little light of hope shining in his heart, suddenly. Perhaps all was not lost; he hadn't killed Silvie's dad, after all!

"Not really," Sydney replied.

Broots deflated. "It's just... I'd gotten sorta... used to him, you know."

Sydney shot him a look that clearly said he didn't, know.

Broots sighed. "He's not a bad tech, you know," he said. "Even if he is... a murdering psycho."

.

Jolene sat in the dining hall, chin in her hand, listening to her Santana CD over the stereo system, waiting for dinnertime to roll 'round. She really had nothing else to do. Her husband was looking after the squirt; they'd gone away to camp, together. She felt left out, alone. She sighed, opening her eyes. She missed her family.

The automatic doors whooshed open, across the room, and she glanced in that direction. The newcomers from Blue Cove: Dr. Green and Mr. Broots. She stood up and went to change the CD to V V Brown, swaying to track 11. Someone had set the CD player to shuffle.

"She's married!" Broots whispered, as they were heading for a table nearby to the one Jolene had been sitting at, a moment or two earlier.

"I'd noticed," Sydney replied, in a low voice.

They watched Alex come in, walk over to Jolene and pull her closer for a hug. Suddenly, she looked distinctly in need of a hug. "How're the family, Jolie?"

She rested her head on his shoulder. "Don't know. Haven't rung. Miss them. Oh, what am I doing? What's wrong with me? Why can't I just leave?" She sighed. "I suppose I'm in it for the long haul, now."

"Unfortunately, I believe you are," Alex replied.

"What an idiot!"

"You are not an idiot, Jolene."

"Yes I am."

"Jolene, you know that's just not true. You're an intelligent woman; you're very competent."

"Not competent enough to read the warning signs," she muttered.

"We can't know everything, Jolene."

She sighed. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, Jolene, as I was half an hour ago. You needn't worry so much."

She snorted. "Needn't I, Alex?"

"No."

Just then, a dark-haired teenager bounded into the room, in all high spirits, and came to a halt beside Alex and Jolene. "_...Can't you see it isn't true?..._" She waved a hand, suddenly, a grin on her face. "Heya, you two!"

"Heya, Atlas," Jolene muttered.

"Ah, can I have my big bro, for a mo'?"

"Nope," Jolene replied, with a sniff.

Atlas laughed. A second later, her expression sobered. "Hang on!" She pointed between them. "Are you guys...?"

Alex and Jolene stepped apart, suddenly, sporting similar _No way!_ expressions. Jolene rolled her eyes and rearranged her expression, glancing at Alex with a smile, then back to Atlas. "You know, I could be tempted, but it'd be against company policy, and I'm kinda keen on keeping my job." She sighed heavily. Oh, if only things were different.

Atlas frowned slightly, not knowing whether to take her seriously or not.

Jolene kept her expression light, smiling at the girl pleasantly.

"Oookay! Moving on!" Atlas took a deep breath. "Do you think you could help me with my homework later, A?"

Alex sighed. "You know you mustn't leave these things to the last minute, Atlas."

She huffed, running a hand over her hair so that little bits of hair stuck up at odd angles. "_I know!_ I've just had so much on my plate, lately! You know how it is - you're a teenager and the days just seem to speed by at warp speed! It's frenetic! Crazy!"

"We'll see how the evening goes," Alex finally replied.

Atlas dropped her shoulders. "Aw! Please, A? I'm desperado here!"

"Of course I'll help," he said, patting her hair.

She made a face. "What's with the hair-patting thing, A1?"

"Who knows, A2? Who knows?"

She stepped back, out of his reach. "Cool! Later!" She whipped around and sped off again, straight back out the door.

Jolene sighed. "Teenagers."

"What is 'warp speed'?" Alex asked her.

She laughed.

Atlas ran back in. "BTW, big bro, there's somethin' funky on your face. Like, dude, Mom's gonna think you bin hangin' out wid da ladies."

"A rash, that is all," Alex replied. "You'll have time for dinner, won't you?"

"Get back to ya on that one!" she called, already back out the door.

Alex sighed and shook his head. "I honestly don't know what she does with her time," he told Jolene.

"Oh, teenagers, they'll find something. They always do!"

Sydney strode over. "Seems you two are quite chummy."

Broots winced. Oh man, Sydney was still on about this! He couldn't just let go, could he! Man! "Syd," he whispered quietly.

Sydney ignored him.

"Oh, totally," Jolene replied, with a cute little flutter in her voice, and giggled, reaching for Alex's arm and resting her head on his shoulder. "We're real tight!"

Alex patted her arm, with a smile.

Broots had the horrible feeling they were having one over Sydney.

"Alex!" Barb snapped, from the door, striding over purposefully.

"Barbara?" he returned, letting his arm fall from Jolene's back.

Jolene quickly got out her lip gloss and fixed the shiny pink coating on her lips.

"What have I said about proximity?" Barb growled.

"Honestly can't remember," he replied. "The stress of the day's just wiped my mind clear clean of all such trivialities!"

Barb's face twisted into a deadly scowl.

Alex, perhaps pushing his luck a little _too_ far, stepped closer and raised a hand to stroke her cheek with the back of his hand. "There, there, darling."

She snapped his hand away furiously, her eyes flashing dark fury. How bloody dare he touch her? She slapped him over the face.

Jolene jumped and dropped her tube of lip gloss, her eyes widening in fright. She stared hard at the floor, not daring to turn, her hands shaking, all of a sudden.

Alex laughed, humourously. "Who knew you were so affectionate, Mother."

A strange glee lit the older woman's face, suddenly, a smile curling her mouth.

A pained expression fleetingly dancing across her features, Jolene spun to face the pair, chin held high. "We've guests, madam Chair," she implored. She directed a frown at Alex. "Come to your senses, Pretender! Act your age! Making a fool of ourselves is far from a joking matter! I want this to desist this instant, Alex! Control yourself."

Alex smirked. "Bite me, girly!" he replied, and swept off, past Barb, for the door.

Barb glared daggers at Jolene, then turned and walked out, also.

"You've always got to stand on her last nerve, haven't you, you silly thing?" Jolene whispered. "Oh, I wish you'd just learn to lay off! Wake up! She's a damn witch! Nothing but a horrid, despotic witch! She'll never be who you want her to be, honey!" She closed her eyes, put her hands up to cover her ears just as any peace she might have been dearly clinging to was shattered by the sound of gunshots.

She dropped down to the floor, hugging her legs.

Broots found himself lurching forward, suddenly, in spite of his alarm at the gunshots. In a heartbeat, he was knelt by her side. "Are you okay?" he asked.

She said nothing, but didn't raise her face from her knees.

"Jolene?"

"She's a witch!"

"Sorry? What's that?"

"I hate her!"

Broots frowned, not knowing what to do, what to say next, how to respond to something like that. "It... It's gonna be okay," he told her. "I-I'm sure."

She laughed and bit back a sob.

Sydney walked over and touched Broots's shoulder. "Leave her be," he said quietly.

"Wha-?" Broots stared up at him, clearly confused.

Sydney leant down and whispered into his ear. "She's a Healer, Broots."

Jolene stared to cry quietly, her shoulders shaking even as she held tighter to her legs.

.

There wasn't much conversation over dinner; it wasn't until they'd retired to Broots's room - they'd been allocated separate rooms, how nice - that Broots finally asked, "Do you think she's the one who... Healed him?"

"No," Sydney sighed. "I doubt the company even knows that she is what she is."

"Oh."

Sydney nodded.

"H-how did you know? That she was a Healer, I mean?"

"It seems to add up," Sydney replied, nodding again. "Catherine agrees, also."

"Oh." Broots frowned, then his eyes brightened and he met Sydney's eye. "D-did Catherine say anything about Miss Parker? About how she is?"

"I'm afraid not. She's very worried, however. As is to be expected. Parker's her daughter."

Broots stared at the carpet bleakly. _Please be okay!_ he thought. _Please don't hurt her!_

.

Sitting on the end of his bed, feet up on the mattress, Catherine sighed. "You know part of the reason Barb's so mad at him is me. I mean, the Plan, and all. I did have a friend in the Tower. Well, at least, working for the Tower. Oh, but he was just a boy then. A teenager. But a boy, really. You know he was all about love for your brothers and sisters and all of that hippie stuff. I swear, I never led him on once. Never had to. Thought it was a good idea for the others: a new life, in an environment where they'd finally flourish as human beings rather than as someone's idea of a fun science experiment. Oh, he was over the moon for that idea, back then, and I gotta say, had he not been, I might have been a little less so myself. I just couldn't help getting caught up in it all. You know, it's said that Barb's his mother, but she got real mad when he chose me over her. Real mad."

Sydney frowned, but didn't go for the light. "Catherine?"

"Yes, Sydney?"

"How is Miss Parker? Do you know?"

"No, I'm afraid I don't. I'm sorry, but you must know that the Tower have a veritable army of very capable Empaths for just this sort of thing. To keep prying eyes firmly out of their dealings."

"I do indeed."

"I'm sorry."

"No. No. Don't be. And how are you holding up through all of this?"

"Oh, I'm quite well. As well as is to be expected, I suppose. I am, after all, dearly departed. Hold the dearly, hold the departed, with an extra side of fries, thank you very much." She laughed. "No, no. I'm fine. It's Angel I worry for."

"And your son?"

She laughed again. "Oh, I do so adore that! 'My son'! I think 'monster' would be more appropriate where that abomination of the human flesh is concerned. That's not a person, Sydney, it's not even _human_. Pray tell, then, how it can be considered someone's son, my dear one?"

"Of course he's your son," Sydney replied, ignoring her sugary tone or the term of endearment she'd tacked on at the end of her sentence there, perhaps to provoke him further. No, it was just another sarcastic turn. She was more like her son than she realised, that she _wanted_ to realise.

She sighed, with a little huff of disappointment. "I don't suppose he'll be leaving now. I suppose he might stay. For her, of course. It's always for her! Excuses, excuses, I say."

"You honestly think he'll recover."

"That one's harder to kill than you'd think, at first glance, my dear. Oh yes! The ones you least want always are."

"You don't want him to survive?"

She laughed airily. "Oh, I never wanted him. Not him! It was the girl I wanted: my beautiful Angel."

"You never told me this before, Catherine."

She snorted. "Oh, I didn't want to alienate you, my dear! Can't you put two and two together yet? I needed you! I needed your friendship!"

Feeling suddenly wounded, Sydney reached for the light.

Catherine smiled at him from the end of the bed. "Oh, what did you expect from a poor orphan girl from another world, Sydney? Comradery? Understanding? Empathy? You are not my kin. This is not my home. My home is just a distant memory now. Why, it gets a little fuzzier each day, a little harder to recall, as if, like me, it's simply fading away into the pages of history. You're alive, Sydney. You live! We have no more in common than two pebbles on two roads, half a world away from each other. Perhaps even less now."

"No. No. That's the illness talking. I won't believe it." He shook his head.

"Believe what you want, my dear," she told him. "But this _is_ me- my beliefs! It's not the illness, Sydney. I'm afraid it never was. I knew. I knew. Even before that abomination had hatched, what sort of a monster it would be. I knew - and I despised it right down to the pit of my stomach, my very core. That I should have to mother such a thing. And alongside my beautiful baby girl! My Angel! And look: just you look how it's corrupted her! _My Angel!_ I always knew this would happen. Somehow, I knew. Even as I took steps to prevent it, _it_ was leading me down the garden path all along. Oh, make no mistake, Sydney: that thing is a _fiend_ and nothing more!"

"Who's making you say these awful things, hmmm?"

She scowled, suddenly, her eyes glinting darkly in the weak light. "_Nobody_ is making me _say anything_, Green!" she snapped, an angry edge to her voice. "I never took you for a fool, my darling, but I see you've fallen until it's spell, too. I see now. It is strong. I've been a fool. A blind fool. This, I could not have foreseen."

"You're making it out to be something that it isn't, Catherine. Surely you must see that! You must see-" He sighed heavily. "Is there no kindness left in you, Cathy? No forgiveness?"

"None!" she hissed. Then she promptly leapt from the bed, cat-like, and melted into the darkness.

"Do you really resent that your daughter had a chance to be with her brother that much, when you could not be with yours...? You think I don't know what that feels like, Cathy?" He laughed, to no-one but himself and the dim light of the lamp. "I had a brother, too. I had a twin once! You are not the only person in the world to have known loss, you selfish woman!" He laughed. Perhaps that was the real reason she'd married James. Because, in him, she'd sensed a deep loss much as her own. Perhaps she had imagined she could control him, through that loss, manipulate their shared experiences to her every little whim. Oh, the poor dear. The poor, poor dear. The blinked fool!

Or, perhaps, she'd been so foolish as to not only manipulate those around her, but herself, also; perhaps she'd honestly believed herself to have fallen in love with James, never realising the true reason behind the pull she felt, tugging her in his direction. Oh, how sad that would be. How very sad. And how very like Catherine, to mistake feelings of kindred-ness for romantic longings, for love.

And perhaps that was the mystery solved; that was why she'd never been happy in her marriage, why even James hadn't been enough to fulfill her life, to make her smile on the inside.

.

"What you may not realise is that your twin really _is_ an Empath!" the Tower guy growled. "In fact, he's _the_ Empath! Noah!" A smile twisted his mouth, at this point. Everybody had heard the story of Noah's attempted rescue, and of his resulting death. "We don't _believe_ that you're completely without Perception of any sort! Your mother, Catherine Parker, was an ISP, after all."

Parker sighed, told the lackey again, "I'm not an ISP! I _don't hear Voices!_ I'm not an Empath! I don't feel other people's touchy-feely shit!" Early that morning, they'd come in and shaken her awake, and rather rudely, she'd thought. Now, she was tired; tired and hungry, and sick of their same stupid questions.

"You're aware, of course, that your false twin, Lyle Sanford, has been - at some point in the past - upgraded?"

"Yes. I know," she replied, starting to lose patience with this guy. Sanford? What the fuck? Where'd they pulled that shit from, exactly? And when had the idiot used that name?

"And do you also know the make and model of his upgrade?"

"Shit, let me think - _no!_ What the fuck, dumb ass! How am I seriously going to know something like _that_? Did that thought ever cross your stupid, little m-"

"It's a prototype model, the first successful prototype implemented on any living being that didn't kill that being within a handful of hours. In layman's speak, a Noah-type upgrade."

"What are you saying?"

"Someone cut your little brother's head open to get that upgrade out, and they did it whilst he was still alive. When the recipient dies, the upgrade dies, too, Melody Parker."

"And you're still willing to bet, hands-down, that he's still alive, somewhere out there?" she asked, as though this guy was totally stupid. "A-live?"

"Yes." The man smiled, now. The effect wasn't pretty, given the topic up for discussion. "He may be incapacitated, but we believe he's still alive. _Breathing._" He said that last word as more of a hiss, a bloody menacing hiss. "Perhaps, they'd been trying to save him, the fools who 'rescued' him."

"And you don't care? You still want him, no matter what? Vegetable, or not?" She suppressed a sarcastic grin. "What, you think you could Heal him, given the chance? Regain your ground in this game?" She laughed, couldn't help it. "Get real, moron! You don't Heal people when their brains have been messed up. Basic Healing 101! You find them a cosy little home six foot under and put them to bed. Nighty-nighty, folks."

The man smiled again. "I think you're forgetting something here, don't you?"

She snorted. "What's that?"

"We've got you."

She laughed. "No shit, Sherlock! And what's that gonna get you, you think? Hmm? A Nobel peace prize, maybe? The Miss Universe Pageant?"

"The Mysterious Healer," the man said simply, still with that smile, and said no more. He left the room.

Parker felt sick. Th-they couldn't really think they'd be able to pull this off! They couldn't really think the Mysterious Healer gave two hoots about someone like her! About _her_!

_It Healed you once_, a quiet, calm voice in her mind reminded her. _It bothered to look twice, chancing upon the sight of you, broken and battered. They don't just want Noah, they want the Mysterious Healer, too. They only want it all!_

No, she would never give them that! she decided vehemently. Not that! Her twin - her _real_ twin - would be bad enough, but not the Mysterious Healer, too.

.

Bobby was in his element, apparently, had decided he was something of a popstar.

Parker tried not to roll her eyes. Please! _For the Good Times_ was so old it wasn't funny. Was this kid even aware of the concept of time? "Bobby?"

"Yes, Miss Parker?"

"Are you waiting for me to come over there and put my hands around your neck and throttle the life out of you?"

"Not particularly, no."

"Shut up!"

He shrugged. "Lo, what news doth thou bring? How goeth thy day, my sweet?"

"Pills!"

He smiled. "What's the word? Whadda they want this time?"

"Oh, not much. Just the Mysterious Healer! And my real twin, in working order."

"Sounds like it could be trouble."

"No shit, genius."

He started humming something awfully '70s German Hit Parade.

"You are one crazy pup," she muttered. "Contrary to what ABBA and whoever else may have advocated, music is not some universal Band-Aid that'll make the boo-boo go away when you're down on your luck and you're out of ammo, facing the inevitable end."

"Well, it's a dang pity there are no pretty girls!" Bobby replied. "Or boys. But I guess that's just the way it goes. Gotta hold your own hand, at the end. Chin up, cos it was great while it lasted, wasn't it? Oh, it was grand!" He sighed, looked around the room, allowed a shred of disappointment to cross his face. "Boy, it's sure lonely 'round these parts!" he said, a little more loudly. "Oh, for the want of a friend, a helping hand." He shook his head, made a face. Wow, that had been amazingly all for nothing. He started humming a Bernd Clüver number. When he started singing along, Parker put a hand to her head, looking pained.

Could this kid ever get with the moment?

"You know what," he said suddenly, "dying sucks! How'm I ever gonna make that up to my girl? Man, I am an idiot!"

"Your girl?" Parker shot. Was this girl blind, deaf and dumb?

"Technically-speaking, she's Lyle's girl. But she's my girl, too, you know, seein' as we're the same person. Kinda."

Parker shook her head. _Don't go there, kid. Don't even go there._

Bobby shrugged, frowned at the ceiling, glanced back to Parker. "The Mysterious Healer, eh? How'd they reckon on that one, then? How are they planning for this thing to go down?"

"I don't know," Parker replied, finally.

"If they hurt you, I'll kill them!" he said, with a twitchy smile, too-wide eyes.

"At last, your true nature comes to the fore!" Parker announced, clapping her hands in congratulatory fashion.

The boy glanced at her as an animal might its prey, smiling, with his head slightly lowered, eyes as wide as ever. "Oh, but you never could have been bought. Right from the start."

"Bingo!"

He widened his eyes for emphasis, smiling still. "Bingo!"

_Pills_, she thought silently. Shit, if nobody was gonna get this kid the pills he so desperately needed, they could at least get her some - and get this little freak outta her head for a moment or two! If this kept up for much longer, the kid was gonna send her loopy, and she wasn't to sure she'd been all that sane to begin with. And where the Hell was her rescue party?

.

Bobby sat down in the corner, eyes staring at thin air, whispered, maybe to no-one, maybe to himself, "Never."

"Never," Parker repeated, with emphasis, but, somehow, she felt as though she'd missed something. This was like one of those moments Lyle would sometimes have, when you just couldn't trust anything he'd said because, really, it could be about anything, that had happened anytime. She had a feeling this was exactly like that.

She snapped her fingers, got down on her knees in front of him, clicked them in his face. "Earth to Robert."

He gave her a glum look.

"We're in this together," she reminded him. "You're with me; I'm with you. No backing out now, Robert. Deserters get shot in the back."

"Humans," he whispered.

She grinned.

"I don't like it. I don't like it." He blinked, his expression serious now. "I don't like it."

"Got that outta your system?"

"We're supposed to be..." He frowned, as though pained; couldn't quite come up with the word.

"Yay, humans!" she cheered, only slightly to take the Mickey.

Suddenly, he looked like he could cry. "I don't want to be one anymore. I don't want to do it anymore. I don't care- I don't _care_! I don't want to..." His eyes got all watery. "It's not fair!" he whispered. "Why do _they_ get to say how it all goes? Why can't we _all_ get a say? I thought we were supposed to be _one_ species."

"I gotta say, now's not the best time for a crisis of faith," Parker told him.

His eyes widened and he leant forward abruptly, jerkily, sharply towards her. "Shhh! The children are sleeping! We mustn't wake the children. The boss is waiting. What will the neighbours say, when they find out? I don't have the time of day for your pathetic bullshit! Get out of my face! Who are you anyway?" Wild-eyed, he hissed, "Why don't you just _die_!"

Even though Parker knew he wasn't directing any of his statements at her, personally, as perfectly aware as she was of this fact, she still felt a very real chill run through her, turning her cold.

Bobby laughed, not a wild-eyed laugh, not anymore, for his eyes were filled with tears, some of which had escaped to run down his cheeks, but a small, wobbly _You let me down_ laugh. _You let me down, and I _believed_ in you!_

She didn't know what else to do but go for the easy money, the easy grab, the sarcastic, biting humour. She couldn't deal with this just now. She didn't know if she'd ever be able to deal with this kind of crap without half a bottle of vodka down the hatch. "Can you say 'bipolar'?"

Bobby didn't get angry or yell at her, he only started crying for real.

Somehow, that was worse. Parker hated seeing other people cry. What was she going to do now? she wondered, without a single bloody clue to guide her, to steer her right.

With no other option popping into view any time soon, she dug into her memory for the melody, and, kicking herself for how really bloody stupid she was about to make herself look, she started singing _Blue Moon_.

When he'd fallen asleep, she sat down beside him, back against the wall, wondering if this was it, she was really going mad, bonkers. "You've gotta talk to them, guys," she whispered. "You've gotta talk to them. They're not some strange, wild animal that doesn't speak your language. They're our kids and we love them. We have since the day they were born." She rested her head on Bobby's shoulder. "It's not so bad, kid. You got me and I got you." She stared at the door, waiting for the next time it opened.

.

"Who the _fuck_ is this?"

Parker's eyes snapped open and she realised, to her immense annoyance, that she'd allowed herself to fall asleep. Bad move, as it turned out. Seeing the Tower lackey's look of flummox, the anger curling in the black of his eyes, it was on the end of her tongue to ask what the Hell he was on about, and then she realised: Pale. Bobby was too pale. He wasn't in her head anymore. He was a real boy.

"Who the fuck are you?" the Tower guy yelled, when Bobby finally opened his eyes.

Without ado, Bobby stood up. "I do believe, sir, that I'm the one you want."

The man pulled a face. "What the fuck are you on about, kid? Furthermore, who'd you get into this bloody room? What you been saying to our friendly miss here?"

"I'm not a kid," Bobby told the man, meeting his eye dead on. "I'm fifty-one, and I'm _fantastic_!" He turned to glance at Parker, smiled at her, put a hand on her shoulder. _You know the way._

She frowned.

_This guy's gonna get real sleepy, real soon. Ready to run, you?_

The Tower guy had taken out his gun, had it pointed at Bobby's head. Still, Bobby hadn't taken his eyes from Parker, wasn't concerned about some gun, some guy with a gun. Was still smiling. _Race ya?_ Then he turned and looked into the man's eyes. Took the gun from him before it slipped from his hands; lay him down on the floor when he collapsed, out cold.

"Won't work for all of 'em," Bobby told her, nodding ahead of them, to the door.

There was a keypad at the door, which required an authorisation code to unlock the door, and a retinal scanner. "I'll distract the guards. You amscray," Bobby told her, keying in the code without a second thought and turning to the scanner.

Parker was about to say something about the guy on the floor back there and how they might have knocked him out _after_ they'd got out of here, when Bobby's right eye changed to mirror that of the guy on the floor's. At that point, all she wanted to say was, "What the...!", but Bobby was already motioning for her to go, get out the door.

"But you're not really," she said, as they hurried down the corridor, "the one they want?"

Bobby only offered her a smile, pushed her in one direction, stepped around the corner in the other. _Showtime!_ "Say, boys, you wouldn't happen to know the way to an exit 'round here, would you?"

_Wrong thing to say!_ Parker thought, but didn't stick around to find out how wrong. She headed for the next intersecting corridor at a brisk jog, all the while thinking, _Is this for real? Shit, tell me this isn't some fucked-up dream their projecting into my head, as we speak!_

It didn't help when, presented with another door, another keypad wanting a code, that the code just seemed to pop into her head, clear as day, and, Bam!, the code was in, the door was open, they were a go. Classic dream-rescue scenario, right? She kept running, her thoughts pounding out the same mantra, over and over, like her shoes on the hard floor: _It's not a dream! It's not a dream!_ If this was a dream, she rationalised, then Bobby would show up, sooner or later, completely unscathed, smiling stupidly. The kid hadn't showed up yet. _It's real!_

_It's real!_

_It's not a dream!_

.

Before she knew it, she was out of the building, running through trees, clean, cold air stinging in her lungs, collecting scratches she couldn't afford to stop and fend off. Then, suddenly, she burst out of the trees, onto a road, into Jarod's arms.

"Heard you'd lost your scouting party," he said easily. "And yet, here you are." He picked a piece of twig out of her hair and walked over to the car, waiting not a dozen paces away, idling still. "Care for a lift, friend?"

Breathing hard, heart pounding wildly, she turned to look behind her, looked back to Jarod. "Yeah." Her voice was almost a rasp, but that was okay. "Thanks."

.

"I'm confused."

"You and me both, it seems," Parker replied, unnecessarily tightening the cap on the now empty bottle of water Jarod had handed her a good half an hour earlier, on the road.

"You thinking _clone_?"

"I don't think so. I don't know. I don't... I dunno. I don't know what to think. How could he be a clone? Come on? And how'd he get into the room they were holdin' me in, in that case? If he'd come in from the outside, to begin with?"

"But you said yourself, he can't have been merely a projection. He knocked that guy out with his Reaper mojo."

"I'm not so sure," Parker told him, grabbing the menu card and scanning it eagerly. Gods, she was hungry!

"What do you mean?"

"'Reaper mojo.' That it was. Coulda bin some kinda... Empath thing, right?"

"I don't think so."

"One o' those mood manipulations those higher-Classes are so famed for?"

"I don't know."

"He did pull some pretty funny shit, though. Somethin' with his eye." She pointed to her own eye, right side. "It changed colour."

"Reaper mojo, right?"

"To look like the Tower guy's eye. And, I mean, this wasn't just some Empath glamour shit; it worked: the machine/thingamabob accepted it!"

Jarod frowned. "Funny," he repeated her earlier descriptor, wholly unamused.

A waitress came up to their table; they gave her their order and she left again.

"So, am I getting this correctly, but they've got it into their heads that _Noah_ is your real twin and that Lyle's some kind of... cheap fake... and Noah's alive? And they wanna... lure the Mysterious Healer with you as the bait, to Heal Noah?"

She nodded. "You've got it correct."

"But then this kid showed up. Saved your bacon, or so it seems."

"So it seems."

Jarod shook his head. "An' you don't think he's a clone?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Way too fucked-up!"

"Lyle could have done that. One of his pals. Raines. Anyone."

Parker shook her head. "Nope."

"He could have uploaded the kid with a handy little software package via his Empathy. Empathic sharing, ya know."

"Nope. 'I'm the one you want.'"

"What?"

"That's what Bobby said. 'I'm the one you want.'"

Jarod frowned. "You're calling him 'Bobby'?"

"Sure. Why not?"

"I dunno. It's fuckin' creepy, pardon my language."

"Pardoned, my friend. Still gonna call him 'Bobby'. Didn't seem to have any objection to it. Even called him 'Robert', not a peep. Guess he thinks he makes it cool again." She frowned, herself, this time. "But what does that mean? Either it's just some fucked-up mindgame of his, or it means something. 'I'm not a kid.' What's it mean?"

"'I'm not a kid'?"

"'I'm fifty-one... I'm _fantastic_!' Fan-fuckin'-tastic, Bobby, but what you talkin' 'bout, boy? You crazy! You know dat, you bin told 'nough times!"

Jarod laughed. "I see."

"What are ya seein', Jarod?" Parker asked, leaning closer.

"I'm the one you want. _I'm_ Noah!" He laughed again. "_I'm_ her _real brother!_ Get it?"

"But he's not!" Parker interjected.

"Couldn't care less, I guess."

Parker sighed. "He can't be a clone. He can't. In that case, he's a Class Five Empath. A Class Five Empath and a Reaper. A Class Five would know if he was being had."

"But, you forget, Parker, Lyle's got a lotta years on this kid."

"But still."

Jarod shook his head.

"Oh, come on, how would he engineer it? He's... dead, frankly. Dead! How?"

"Sydney says otherwise. Says he might make it, yet. Live to mess us around another day, Heaven forbid."

"Still, no way." She shook her head. "I don't buy it."

"So Raines sicced the kid onto the place. Stepped in for Creep Central. Like that'd be a big surprise to anybody. Wow, the guy's in league with a sociopath. No surprises there."

"I still don't know."

"Hey, anyhoo, but you're out. You're safe. That's all that counts, right?"

"And what about Bobby?"

"Time for a reality check, I think."

Parker frowned. "He's a kid, Jar."

"Not according to him, he ain't. Said he was your age, didn't he? High time for a little RC, I think."

The waitress returned with their orders; Parker nodded thanks, never taking her eyes from Jarod's. _Cold, Jar. Cold. Not like you._

"What did you think would happen, Parker?" Jarod asked finally. "You'd get out, the kid'd get out; you'd be able to 'rehabilitate' him? Are you havin' me on, or somethin'?"

Parker chewed on a chip and said nothing. She was pissed at him and didn't trust herself not to say something hurtful, and he _had_ saved her ass not a few hours ago. He deserved a bit of leeway, if only for a couple o' hours.

"Oh," Jarod added, in a note of disgust, "and Alex is alive."

Parker choked, reached for her black coffee. "Who's smart idea what that?"

"Barb Loginov. Chairwoman of the Ala-"

"Bama. Yeah, I'm familiar. Reston's a Bama boy. Barb's golden boy, so it's said. Creeps the shit outta me, you ask me. Wow, but Ally. Good old Ally. There's a surprise no-one'll want, guaranteed. Sydney tell you this, too?"

"Yep."

"Insightful guy."

"Alabama put them up for the night."

"Kind of them."

"That's one way of putting it."

"Mmm." Parker pointed a finger at him. "Bama's got Healers. Or, a Healer. One of 'em, at least. Bought one. Didn't come cheap, either. Could Heal Gotta-Get-Myself-Shot-By-The-Tower-Cos-It's-Like-Cool-Baby."

"No. He's blacklisted."

"Aw. For takin' Kyle out?" She froze. She had totally just said that, hadn't she? Aw, fuck!

"I'll just pretend I didn't hear that," Jarod answered frostily. "And no, that's not why. According to Brown, his Empathy's too unstable. He could hurt anyone who tried Healing him."

"Look-"

"I'm pretending I didn't hear it. Don't bring it up again."

Parker made a face, grabbed another chip. "Are you... disappointed? Were you hoping he'd die?"

"I don't know." Jarod frowned, shook his head. "I really don't know, Miss Parker."

.

"What if they come after us? What then? We run again?"

Jarod nodded behind her. "Nah, not today. We're with these guys."

Parker glanced over her shoulder at a young woman coming their way. Oh crap! T-Corp! "What are you doing? Your affiliation with the Centre runs out in a couple of weeks! These guys could get your scent and tail you for a couple weeks, layin' low, easy, then, Wham-O!, scoop you up jus' like that, take you back to their secret hiding place and keep you there as their little plaything-come-prisoner for thirty plus years! You want that again?"

"Nah, I got a couple o' weeks," he said, waving a hand dismissively. "Hi, the name's Jarod."

"I am well aware of who you are, thank you," the young woman replied formally. "Swiftly, if you please."

"Swiftly?"

"Yes, sir, that is my name. Don't stare, it makes me uneasy."

"I-it's a charming name."

The young woman smiled tightly and glanced behind her, to the rest of her party.

Parker looked, too, and did a doubletake. Wasn't that... that guy!

"Doug!" Jarod breathed darkly, picking the guy out immediately.

The man frowned. "Hey? Oh, right, yeah. My brother's name is Doug. Yeah. People often say how we look alike." He gave a short laugh. "Though, it's not really that funny. He's... well, you know, to put it frankly, my brother's in jail. For some rather unpleasant things, might I say."

A woman came stomping over, pointing out the window with an angry look on her face. "Douglas, you moron! Can't you read? Remove that vehicle from there at once!"

"What? You talkin' to me, Fun Stuff? The name's Marcus. Marcus, Funny Bone. Got it?"

She scowled. "Oh no! No, that's them, isn't it? The ones that tow away illegally-parked vehicles?"

"Wha-?"

"It's just the Wildlife Service, Sis," the younger woman told her. "Cool ya jets. Doug, please move the car. Funsuni's right; it's in a no-standing zone. We could get a fine for that, the car impounded. We could get into a lot of trouble with the cops. You don't want that, do you? The cops?"

Douglas glanced at Funsuni. "You know I can't read, Funny Bone."

"Quit calling me that idiotic name already!" she snapped.

He shrugged and walked off, to move the car apparently.

Jarod frowned. "And you're... Sarah."

She huffed, putting her hands up in front of her. "You got me!"

"But..."

"But..." She started laughing, for no logical reason.

"You were... you were part of some kind of cover up, weren't you? Involving-"

Parker kicked his shoe under the table before he opened his big trap and went reminding them about Annie Raines, missing dead girl. Dead ex-missing girl.

"Cover up? What are you talking about? You FBI Agents! You're all paranoid, right down to your little bitty molars!"

"Shouldn't he be in jail?"

"No. They let him out on good behaviour. What's your excuse?"

"Pardon me?"

"Sis!" Swiftly hissed.

Funsuni - formerly "Sarah" - flashed him a smile and nodded to Parker. "Nice day out, eh?"

"Yeah, it is a nice day," Parker returned, falsely cheerful.

"DOUG!" Funsuni bellowed suddenly, and Parker had to resist the strong urge to gain her feet, swoop over there and clobber her one over the kisser. She'd just about had a heart arrest, God almighty!

Douglas marched back into the diner. "Yes, milady? You called?"

Funsuni slapped him over the back of the head. "That your woman, Bridie, over there?"

He looked in the direction she was now staring and seemed to deflate, his shoulders drooping.

Swiftly looked too. "She looks yummy."

Funsuni grinned and nudged Douglas with an elbow. "So how come you let that one get away? Swiftly's right. She's a looker."

He gave her a dirty look. "There weren't no chemistry between us, if you must know, Funny Bone."

She laughed, prodded him in the chest, a second later, as serious as death. "Quit it with that name, Dougie!"

"Then you quit calling me 'Dougie'."

Swiftly squealed, waving her hands about as though something was on fire. "Oooo, she's coming over here! What do I do? Oh, gosh, there's nowhere to hide!"

"Why would _you_ need to hide, Swiftly?" Funsuni asked, with a daft look on her face. "She doesn't know _you_."

Swiftly nodded. "Ex-ex..." She frowned, her eyes snapping to Douglas. "Run, Dougie! Run!"

"Run where?" he shot, in exasperation.

Bridie stopped dead in her tracks, obviously having spied Douglas.

He winced.

Her eyes widened.

"Yeah, hi," he mumbled. "I... I see you got yourself a real little earner there, Brides. A job 'n' all. Very... good. Good o' you. I-" He fell short.

"What are you doing here?" Bridie managed to ask, in an almost normal tone.

"Workin'. Sorta... Yeah."

"'Yeah,'" Funsuni imitated, in an _I'm thick, kinda like a chopping block_ tone.

Swiftly snickered, put a hand up to cover her mouth. Couldn't hide the little sparkly bits in her eyes, however.

"That's what I'm doin'."

Bridie seemed to go on staring, for a drawn-out moment, before she remembered, oh, yes, she was a waitress and she'd just bumped into some potiental customers. "I-is there anything I can get you today?" she asked, now, as though she didn't know them at all, had just met them today.

"H-"

Parker kicked Jarod's foot again. Not now. They were Reapers, and Reapers had exceptionally good hearing. He could keep his conspiracy theories to himself until they'd said bye-bye to this diner and the band of merry Reapers here along with it.

"Do you serve marshmallows?" Swiftly was asking. Marshmallows were important to her.

Parker sipped the last of her black coffee, wondering why Jarod had called them, or however he'd got in contact with them. "What's the deal with these guys, anyway? Why're they here? With us, more to the point? Apart from the obvious: to keep the Tower off our backs, if they show. What's the deal here? How're we involved with them?"

"I thought they could, you know, hit us with one of their enticing sales pitches. 101 reasons you wanna join our company. That way, if the Tower shows, we can make like we're really considering joining these guys."

"Been there, done that!" Parker droned. "Hated it. Sucked. Never again, in my life. Full stop, period, whatever. Never ever."

"We- we can 'make like' we're considering it. Pretend."

Parker shot him a glare, her eyes narrowed. "Stuff that, why don't I just make like I pull my gun and shove it in those freaks' faces and say, 'You wanna live, go bye-bye. You wanna die, stick around, pal. Si' down, stay awhile, order somethin' to fill ya up. Hungry, you must be hungry. Ain't everyone hungry these days. Could help you out, fill you right up. Yep, you gots ya, wit' these li'l lead friends of mine. They just so tasty! So ta-'"

"Parker!"

"I wanna hurt someone!"

Funsuni glanced their way, looking worried and disturbed, all at the same time. "I hear ya, sister. If someone took my sister out, I'd wanna hurt them, too. Badly so. Kebabby, I'd probably rip shreds off them!"

Jarod frowned, glanced at Parker. What _was_ she talking about?

"Sorry, _sister_, but I'm the one who took a sister out. Me an' my four-wheeled pal-eo."

"Nuh-ah, sister, you ain't heard the full story, though. Your sister lived. That Mystery Healer. Done gone and Healed your sister right up. They sent her to IRIS for punishment. Found out, though, and they wasted 'er. Her own boy, too. Stone cold wasted a sister! What a bastard, _chica_! What an ass! Oooh, I would love to get my teeth into that one. Rip him to teeny-tiny little pieces and-!"

"Yo, sister, that's her bro you talkin' about, my girl," Swiftly interrupted. "And what's with the speak?"

"I dunno. I just practicisin', 's all."

"But you ain't African-American."

"So what, sister. Can't a sister talk how she like the'e days withou' someone ou' there jumpin' all over her back abou' it?"

"Be my guest, Sis, be my bloody guest," Swiftly replied, stepping back from the older woman.

"What's that I hear outta yo' mouth, girl? You talkin' gutter talk?"

"Did I say the f-word? No. You heard no such thing leave my mouth, sister, so gimme a break."

"Yeah, but I'm watchin' you. You remember, I'm watchin'."

"Creep."

"Wha's 'at?"

"Nuttin'."

"And i' better be too, or else I gon' have t' take you up on my knee and spank you, Swiftly Yale Davis!"

Swiftly snorted, having trouble keeping a straight face. "You such a doofus, Sis."

"They gone?"

"They gone."

"Is who gone?" Jarod asked.

"Them no-good rubbernecks! Rivals! Who'd you think? Must've caught the scent of somethin', likely one o' you two, but they didn't wanna take any chances with us. Wise move. Wise move."

"Lucky save, I guess."

"It's what I get paid for," she replied. "It's sure not just for babysittin' that big oaf over there, you know. Douglas Manfred Willard Ignoramus."

"Bridie and he are Convergence partners?" Jarod asked.

"Yeah, but he's not big on that sort of thing, I guess. Romantic relationships. He's a bit shy."

"You don't say," Parker muttered. She'd read all about his 'crime'. To say it was not cute would be sugar-coating it just that bit too far. "So, Funny, you mentioned my friend before. Roslin, right?"

"Ros-lin Morgarn. _Sí._ You haf questions?" She was at her Mexican impersonation now.

"Just one question," Parker replied. "A name, that's all."

Swiftly shook her head; no. Funsuni glanced at her, but got the same thing, more shaking of the head.

"What's... what's the problem?" Parker asked, glancing between the two women.

"No!" Swiftly whispered.

Funsuni ignored the younger woman and shook her head to herself, returning her glance to Parker's face. "It was your brother, _sí_. The other Parker. The _loco_ one."

"Lyle?"

"_Sí._ That's the one."

"He killed Roslin?"

"No choice." She made a cutting motion in the air with her hand. "Company says you do, you do, or company takes care of you, too."

"Oh, wow, now doesn't that sound just like my brother?" Parker asked cheerfully, turning a falsely friendly _You see_ glance on Jarod who was still struggling to understand any of this. Parker had somehow gotten involved with T-Corp, then gotten uninvolved, and, in between this, she'd had a friend she thought she'd killed when, in reality, Lyle had. It was all very strange, to be honest.

"Roslin and Mimi, they're the same person, right?"

Parker shot him an annoyed look, but nodded. "Right. Why?"

"You fell in with this lot in boarding school in Canada, didn't you?"

"Yeah. And?"

"No. Nothing. I just never knew any of this before. So, no, Sarah's right. Your friend, Mimi, she didn't die in that car accident. She was Healed. By the Mysterious Healer, they say. If she died, it was later. You never told me you'd had a friend, Parker."

"Well I don't, now, do I?" Parker replied tightly. "She's dead. Thanks to everyone's favourite sociopath."

Funsuni sighed heavily and shook her head. "Should have brought him along with you, miss. I'd have gladly taken care of him for ya."

Parker shook her head. "He's one of you. Don't want something like that getting out."

"No. You're right. Pity, though. You really mean it? He's one of us? I feel slightly insulted now."

"No wonder."

"Mmm..."

A pothole in the road saw to it that she was thoroughly yanked from her sleep, and Parker squinted through the windscreen at the shabby, unsealed road ahead. She'd eaten too much. Really, she had. For this road, at least. Just looking at it out the windshield made her feel queasy. Jarod couldn't have taken a more charming route, could he have! she thought happily. Oh no, no, no!

"You were talking just before, in your sleep."

Parker scowled. "Oh shut up!"

"Yeah. No, I'm not kidding, Parker. You were. It was just hard to make out, was all."

She laughed falsely. "Oh really? Well, go on, impress me. What ya get?"

He sighed. "Mumbling. You were mumbling, Parker. I couldn't make anything discernible out of it, just a load of mumbling."

"Charming."

"Well, it was. Though, to be honest, I'm glad you've stopped. Looked like you were having a pretty rough time of it there. Worried about the kid, huh?"

"No. No, no. It was nothing like that."

"I see."

"Mmm."

"Well, if you don't want to talk about it-"

"I don't!" she snapped stiffly.

"Okay! Okay! Then we won't. That's... that's the last you'll hear out of me about it."

"Fine!" she scowled darkly.

"Yep. Fine."

They went on driving, dust rising behind the vehicle in a great upward tide, doing a good imitation of a sandstorm, albeit on quite a smaller scale, and the road went on, with them.

.

It had something to do with the moment when Bobby had Empathically shared those codes with her, she decided. Somehow, she'd drawn something else through that fragile connection, something she'd been looking for, something Bobby mayn't even have known she'd taken. Answers to her questions, but they wouldn't come easily. Deciphering them was going to take time. She felt a shiver work its way through her. What would come next? she wondered. What answers, to what questions? And would she want to know them, when they came? How much could the kid know, really? How much did he know that he wasn't saying?

She glanced out the window, scenery passing by in a blur of colours and assorted shapes. How was Bobby? she wondered. How was that funny, crazy kid? Had those Tower Sweepers taken care of him yet? What might they have done with him, if they'd got their hands on him?

.

"What's that for, anyway?"

"You really don't know?"

Parker rolled her eyes. "Would I _really_ ask if I already knew?"

"I suppose not. I'm scanning for signs of a biomechanical tag. Looks like they didn't think it necessary. You appear clean."

"I didn't expect to get out, either. I don't know how Bobby did it, but it looks like he did. Unless," she tossed her head, "you know: this is all just some crazy Empathically-directed dream."

Jarod laughed, then seemed to sober. "That could work, you know. I was with the Centre for a long time. Enough time, by far, for one of their Empaths to get a good read on me. And that waitress, the people we've come across so far, could be an illusion." He sighed. "I guess we'll really know when we get back to mine."

"You're taking me to meet your family?" Parker asked, with a humourous smile, and a touch of disbelief in her voice. "Is that wise? What if... the Tower's using my Inner Sense in conjunction with some Empath triumvirate or whatnot, and they're attempting to use me as a tool to locate your family's whereabouts?"

Jarod frowned, shaking his head. "What?"

"Stuff like that's got to be possible, right?" she asked, sipping her lukewarm coffee, poured from a flask Jarod had filled at the diner: instant coffee: great.

"I suppose. It doesn't encourage happy thoughts."

"'It doesn't encourage happy thoughts!'" Parker laughed. "You couldn't be more right, boy! Think of it, if Empaths really pull that, why hasn't Lyle found you yet? Or, at least, your family? Ethan's supposed to be his half-brother, right? To whom he has a connection?"

"Ethan may have been blocking him," Jarod replied.

"Oh? Blocking a Class Five?"

"Raines must have trained him to Block a little, at least."

"I guess."

"A good Inner Sense Possessor must be able to sustain, initiate, resist and terminate connections with the other-side streaming. And Raines will have wanted Ethan to be a proficient ISP, as well as controllable. A fine line to walk, but apparently an achievable one.

Parker gave this some consideration. "Do you know Ethan's classification, as an ISP?"

"No."

"You've never asked?"

"It seemed... not right."

"Eloquent, genius."

"That's just how it seemed, to me."

"I guess you're right. His Inner Sense has always been used as a means to manipulate him. Asking how good of an ISP he is would probably have been as cute as a slap over the face, or rubbing in everything that's happened in the past, everything he's done wrong, every painful experience. Here he is, with this wonderful ability, and yet he still couldn't protect those he most cared about, his parents." She sighed. "Poor kid."

"How are you feeling, anyway?" Jarod asked, finally putting the biomech reader away once more in its cardboard packaging.

"That's an MU," Parker said, suddenly now interested in the thing.

"Yeah. A type of one."

"Can it upload from a Monitor?"

"The guy I bought it from told me 'yeah'. Why do you ask?"

"Nothing. Just thinking out loud," Parker replied, with a thoughtful frown.

"Thinking about...?"

She sighed heavily. "If you must know, Bobby."

Jarod frowned. "You think he's upgraded, like Lyle? With the same type colony?"

"A Noah-type," Parker said now, with a frown.

"Yeah? Lyle's got a P0260-type upgrade? That's risky. Where'd you hear that?"

Parker's frown remained in place. "Momma thinks it's a Noah-type, anyway." Why had she lied? she wondered. Why hadn't she just told Jarod the truth? Lyle wasn't her twin at all.

"Hmm."

"What's... what's that mean? P0260?"

"Noah's upgrade was a prototype, hence the 'P'. 0260: for the month and year of development. February, 1960."

"How old was this kid when they upgraded him, anyway."

"He was born the same year as Angelo and yourself, so he'd have been about a year old. Fourteen months, I've heard it said. You share the same birth month."

"Yay!" Parker remarked bleakly, an attempt at a sarcastic quip. "Fourteen months. That's fuckin' barbaric, if I say so myself. For once, I've gotta hand it to the Tool. He _is_ right. Upgrading is barbaric, no matter how old you are when you get it done. You know the survival stats? Five years, on average. That's all you get. Five measly years! Eight years, _max_."

"Hardly viable, eh?" Jarod sighed. "Yeah, Broots told me."

"Lyle told him one day. The idiot should have known Broots couldn't be upgraded, no matter how good he is at that tech crap. He's not an Empath. He doesn't even possess the Anomaly." She shrugged. "Then again, I guess it wasn't about Broots. He was pissed off about his own upgrades. That's why he went and lagged on the Tower about their doctoring the figures." She rubbed her forehead. "I guess someone must have told him those things last quite a bit longer than they actually do."

"That was back in '03," Jarod recalled, "which, if we take it to mean he was upgraded around about that time." He joined Parker in frowning. "Eight years."

Parker's eyes snapped up from the splintered wooden tabletop. "Uck!"

Jarod gave a heavy sigh.

"He has been acting... different, lately," Parker offerred. "Funny, for him, you know."

"Do you think the prototype could have less of a harmful effect on the human body than those upgrades developed later on?"

"No. Think of it: Why was it developed in '60, but the kid only got the upgrade in '61? I mean, sure, they didn't have the kid then, but, come on, there must have been others they'd be willing to sacrifice to achieve glory. It must've killed them, Jarod. Noah was just lucky, I guess. Or, alternately - depending on how you look at it - he was damn _un_lucky." She frowned. "The kid made upgrading a reality, right? Then, don't you think he'd have done the thing properly? Given his comrades a little longer than half a decade to play with? If he _could_ have."

"Shortcuts," Jarod replied. "Cost-cutting. The burden of implanting the controls they needed to maintain a firm hold over their upgraded Empaths. The Tower would not have followed to Noah's work to the letter; they'd have implemented their own little quirks into the works."

"And you think that's why Raines went to the trouble of getting Lyle upgraded with Noah's upgrades? So the Tower would have no chance of interfering?" _It was never about Noah being my twin_, she thought silently. Come to think of it, did Raines even know? If it had been the Tower who'd taken Theodore away... But then, Raines must have known that Lyle was not, in fact, her twin. As a Healer, he must've known that. And if they'd swapped the kids over right after Raines had sent the baby away... But, no, a Healer wouldn't have been fooled, no matter what. No matter the years that passed. A Healer remembered. Just like you didn't forget your first kiss, Healers remembered each and ever person they Healed. And if Raines had revived the kid when he'd been born without a heartbeat... it would be a pretty hard ask, pulling the wool over his eyes. Unless Lyle, himself, was involved in the deception. Unless he'd been involved from the start.

"That may very well have been an aspect of it," Jarod agreed, but she hardly noticed.

Bobby - Lyle - had been trained as an Empath before Raines had even met him, she thought, with a sudden clarifying revelation. And he'd been good. Good enough to fool a damn great Healer.

Jarod frowned, noticing suddenly the way Parker's chest was heaving, as though she'd just returned from a long run. "Parker?"

But who had he been trained by? Who was he really loyal to? And how had they, even after all these years, managed to preserve that loyalty?

"Mel?"

She snapped to abruptly, a look of startle colouring her eyes glimmery. Could it be...? Could it be that Lyle honestly believed them to be brother and sister? _Could_ they be related? Could... Catherine be the one behind the deception? Would she honestly be able to stand by and watch the loony run rampant like that? And if he was... her child - her nephew, even - could she really stand by? Would she be able to stand culturing that kind of ethos, that kind of deception of his fellow human beings?

She bit back a dark laugh. Yeah, her mom had been one mad bitch, but that didn't mean... damn, it didn't mean she'd be able to believe her that kind of witch! For a long time, she'd been angry at her mom - shit, she was _still_ angry at her - but part of that anger was wrapped up in the fact that Cathy had been her mom, had been someone she'd loved! She didn't know if she could buy it, even if she'd been the one to think it up in the first place. It didn't mean she was right, she suppposed. She was merely considering every option, as was only thorough.

But who the heck else would have been able to manipulate Bobby? she wondered. He must have been trained from a young age, therefore, it must have been someone he'd meet on a regular basis, someone people wouldn't see a problem with his hanging out with. Mom or Dad, a teacher... That Sunny one! That Sunny, so-called Music and Drama teacher, had seemed to really care for Bobby, she remembered. Had believed in him. And she'd had no problem saying so, either. So what had blondie really been saying? "I'm proud of my work? Cripes, I'm a whiz Empath trainer?" Could it really be that simple, and that fucking brilliant? Was she getting ahead of herself?

"Earth to Mel!"

And that damn boy was obsessed with his popstary-ness! she thought with a snicker. A subconscious cue, perhaps? A case of trying too hard to impress his mentor and quite accidentally giving the game away in the process? Or maybe the kid was just insane, in love with himself, or Sunny McBarbie.

She snickered. Yeah, that'd be right. Though, flaxen-haired beauties weren't really Lyle's types. Unless that was the point: couldn't have laid a harmful finger on that annoying-as-Hell Cleary, but Jarod's sister was no _problema_.

She narrowed her eyes.

"Parker?"

"What?" she snapped, pushing Jarod's hand away from her arm. "In the middle of SIMing something here, genius!"

"You, SIMing?"

"Shut up! Well, maybe not SIMing, but I was sure pulling some strenuous thinking. Just _thinking_ about that sociopath is painful!"

"Lyle?"

"I don't think he's really ever been on our side," she replied.

"No surprises there, Parker."

She scowled. "Or Raines's, either!"

"Yeah?" Jarod feigned scepticism.

"Yeah."

"You know, Parker, the only side he's ever really remained faithful to is his own!"

"No! There's someone else involved here."

"Come on." He grinned.

"No, it makes perfect sense. He's not that brainy, Jarod. You and I both know that. There's someone else contributing their brains to the outfit here. Someone else pulling the proverbial strings."

Jarod gestured jazz hands.

Parker snapped her fingers. "Exactly!"

He frowned. "'Exactly', Parker?"

"Sunny McShane!"

"Ah."

"Ah?"

"Hmm."

Parker's eyes widened. She waved her hands strangely, as if they'd caught fire, out of the blue. She made a funny rasping sound in the back of her throat.

"What?" Jarod asked, a little lamely. He just knew Parker was going to say something potentially mentally-scarring. Just knew it!

"Remember how she said she just kinda fell in love with him? With this frickin' five-year-old!"

"Sure. She said it to you, not me, but I remember you yapping it at me, yeah."

"What if they have Convergence?" she gasped.

Jarod gagged. "Argh! Do you know how traumatic that is for me to hear?"

Parker shot him withering look.

"But I don't believe in Convergence," he said, only just remembering that little detail.

"Does it really matter what you believe?" she asked, with a mental snort.

"Nice."

"Oh, get over it!"

"'Get over it', Parker? You've mentally scarred me for life - and you tell me to 'get over it'! Heck, woman, _I love you_!"

"Why, thank you. I am quite lovable."

He snorted. "What, you think the Drama teacher's the one who's been pulling Psycho's strings all these years? And to what end?"

"That, I'm still working on."

Jarod rolled his eyes. "I think you should stop thinking about this guy. You're as bad as my sister. He's just some guy, Parker. He's not remotely important."

Parker laughed and choked at the same time. Then a strange look overtook her eyes. "Never," she whispered.

"What?" Jarod asked, confused.

"Bobby... said 'never'."

"And?"

"And? 'The End of Time'. Wilfred offers the Doctor the gun, says use it to defend yourself, keep your life. And the Doctor gives him this... look, and he says, '_Never_'."

"Wilfred? The who? What kind of a name is that? Argh!"

Parker stared at him in astonishment or horror, for one fleeting moment, then she cried, "_Doctor Who_, Jarod!"

"Ah!" He pointed, did funny eyes. "Argh, that British show! I always wanted to watch that!"

She snorted. "'...Wanted to'! Gods, Jar, you're _a genius_!"

"Argh! Tell me. Quickly. What's your point? This Wilfred guy gives this other guy a gun and says he should use it to protect himself from someone, or some dudes, who are out to get him, and this guy says, 'Thanks, but no thanks'; 'Violence begets violence, breeds violence, et cetera'..." He huffed. "It's just _one_ word, Parker! You don't even know that was what the kid was on about, for goodness sakes!"

"Debbie watches the show."

"Debbie?"

"Debbie Br-"

"I know, I know! Lil Broots. But what's your point?"

"Lyle and Debbie talked about it, sometimes."

"Lyle and Debbie talked? And no-one thought that perhaps that wasn't such a jazzy idea?"

Parker shrugged. "Sure, but what could we do about it? If she wants to talk to Fries, who are we to stop her?"

"Fries?"

"Debbie used to work part-time at McDonalds."

"Point?"

"Well, obviously Lyle knows the show. He'd hardly have been talking to Debbie about something he didn't know."

"This _is_ Lyle we're talking about..."

Parker waved a hand dismissively. "Debbie's not his type. You know that."

Jarod snorted, dropping his shoulders. "This 'his type' crap's really starting to peeve me off, frankly. _Come_ on! Like it's some bloody excuse! Or, worse... _Worse!_ You see him chatting to some chick you assume isn't his type, you instantly think, _Nada. She'll be fine. He won't do nuttin' to her._ Yet, he threw my sister out some window, the scumbag!"

"He's not going to hurt Debbie, Jarod. He knows I'd kill him. Or else Silvie would."

"Debbie's best friend?"

"There's a dark side to that one, Jarod. Don't under-estimate her. Broots doesn't call her 'witch' for nothing."

"I thought it was because she's a Goth."

"But, getting back to the topic."

"Getting back to the topic, then. Your little friend's some peace-loving hippie now!" He laughed.

"Uck! No! I don't know! That's the point - _I don't_ know! I don't know but... just because he dies doesn't mean we're off the hook with whoever's been behind this thing all along."

"_If_ he dies? I thought we were going with 'the bastard lives'... And 'this thing'? What _thing_, Parker?"

She shrugged, stood to her feet. "Look, let's just drive. Since you mentioned it, I'm itchin' to meet your fam' now. You're right: I do sound like some crazy, obsessed freak." She shivered illustratively, and walked back to the car. Time to go, then. At the car, she called back, "Coffee sucks, BTW." Wasn't sure if her voice got carried away by the wind that had struck up a few minutes earlier, or if Jarod heard.

.

"You know, Lyle and this kid are obviously different people."

"Yeah, I-"

"Well, maybe the kid's not this big pawn you've made him out to be. Maybe this stuff he was telling you, was him talking."

"So?"

"So, _he_'s the one saying this stuff, not Lyle! It has nothing to do with that freak! A convenient disguise!"

"What's that supposed to mean? You think this kid imagines some relationship between me and him? Shit, we've never met before! Or, what, he's saying: 'I've heard about you. Thought you were pretty ace, actually. Would be an honour to die for you'? That kinda shit?"

"I'm just saying. Maybe getting you out of that place had nothing to do with Lyle. Maybe, maybe Lyle doesn't even _know_ about this kid. Maybe he is a clone."

"The Tower's work, then?"

"Raines's maybe? He figured onto the same thing you just did, thought, heck, why not take out some insurance. So he made himself a spiffy, neat-O Class Five Empath."

"Raines? Really?"

"Could be. Plus, he did say to you that he was your father. He's already lost one daughter-"

"So says the authorities."

"What?"

Parker shrugged, pretended like the intense look Jarod was beaming her way wasn't remotely bothersome. What the heck! She'd have to watch her mouth, in future. It was just a dream, for darn sake! Just a dream. "Forget it. I'm just saying."

"I worked on that case, Parker."

"I remember. You wouldn't lie about something like that, not even to hurt Raines. You'd be hurting Annie, too, or else; you'd be using her unfairly, in something she'd have no control over. And you'd never do something like that. I know. I know." She sighed. "I'm sorry."

Jarod made a face. He didn't need that. He didn't need her apologies. He shook his head. "You don't have to... say it. I... know you'd never do anything to put Annie's image at risk, either. She... she could be your half-sister. Could've been your half-sister..."

Parker nodded. "I suppose it could have been Raines. Shit, it comes with the added bonus that rescuing me's sure to have really pissed the Tower off. What's not to love about that? And," she waved a hand, "as Lyle betrayed him, disappointed him, whatever, he's not really going to give two stuffs about his clone." _Except, he's a Healer: he knows very well that they're two different people, that the kid can't honestly, sanely been held accountable for crazy Lyle's actions._ Nothing Lyle had ever done had anything to do with that kid; they were two separate entities. "Perhaps you're right; perhaps he is a clone."

"But you still have your doubts?"

"No." She waved her hand again, looked to her side window. "No. I need time to think. Possibly a lot more time."

"Take all the time you need."

"Yeah, I think I might..."

.

It was dark now, and Jarod was keeping a careful eye on the road. Still, he said, "What about that Mysterious Healer, Parker? What if - going with that he _is_ a he - he was your brother? Your twin?"

Parker sniggered. For some reason, she'd always felt kinda defensive of the Mysterious Healer. Which was probably because it/he/she had Healed her.

"That's funny somehow, is it? He - _or_ she - did Heal you."

"_Je sais._"

"So?"

"An ISP/Healer?"

"It's possible, right?"

"Sure."

"Well, then..."

"Ah, come on."

"Anything's gotta be than Lyle."

"Oh!"

"Oh, no. You're the one who doesn't buy that he's your twin. So who would you be happy with?"

Parker scoffed, offended. "That's not what it's about!" she snapped. "It's not bloody about whether he's a decent guy or not - Lyle's not my twin, plain and simple. I should know!"

"And that's not one massive cop-out? 'I should know.'"

"Oh-!" She shook her head, growled at the black glass reflecting her own angry image back at her, in her side mirror. "The bloody Tower don't think he's my twin, either, for your in-for-mation! I've already told you this, though!"

"Sure."

She laughed.

"And do you always believe everything they say, Parker?"

"Fuck you, you asshole!"

"Sure," he replied merely.

She glared at the glass, at the dark look gracing her face, in the glass.

"Why would your twin be an Empath, Miss Parker. T-Corp Scripture says, in general, that twins share expression. Like Sydney and Jacob. I don't necessarily believe that Lyle's your twin, but I don't see any more reason to just take it on face-value that Noah is, either. Remember when we used to think Noah was a Pretender? When everyone but the African branch did? I think, when it comes to that kid, it's just one manipulation after the other. Everyone makes up their own little story to suit their own purposes. So, you see, it's just as likely for your _true_ twin to be a Healer as it is for him to be an Empath. Isn't it?"

"I hate the fucking Tower!" she growled, several long moments later.

"Which is great, because Raines does, too. A good fit for you being his daughter, or he being your father. Like kiddo, like Daddy. Or: like Daddy, like kiddo."

"Shut up," she muttered darkly. Kiddo. _Kiddo._ How fuckin' Kyle! How fuckin' dead boy. She swallowed the lump in her throat. Fuckin' bullshit! She thought, in a moment of stray hurt, wandering sadness, _I'm real sorry, K. That sick fuck's right, though. You were a brother. My brother, even. Yeah, not by blood, but we were the same. Taken advantage of, for some other freak's benefit. I'm sorry you're dead; sorry you didn't get to... be happy._ Then she shook it off, put it away, rearranged her face into its usual mask.

"I don't even know what you're fuckin' saying, moron!" she snapped. "So what if Noah's not my fuckin' twin? So suddenly he's not worth shit! Gods, what an asshole!"

"I didn't say anything of the sort, Miss Parker," Jarod replied, keeping his eyes on the road. Why bother to meet her eyes, to incense her further? He sighed. "Have you noticed it, Parker? How, lately, you've been uncharacteristically defensive of all these kids?"

"Oh fuck off!"

"But you've gotta admit. You _have_ been."

"That's none of your Goddamn business!" she growled, in splintery tones.

"Perhaps the Tower were never talking about getting Noah back, about restoring him to his former glory - perhaps this was about you, instead. You and the Mysterious Healer."

She snorted, rolled her eyes at the window.

"What if all they wanted was a spiffy ISP/Pretender/Healer?"

She turned her head and glared at him. "Well they didn't get their wish, _idiot_! I got away!"

"Yeah. You did."

She growled. "They didn't fuckin' touch me, freak!"

"And you can say that for sure, can you?" he asked.

She showed him her finger, then crossed her arms tightly. Angrily, she went back to glaring at the darkened window.

.

As they came up the drive of some fairly average-looking farm, complete with farmhouse and shabby outhouses, a woman came out to meet them. Parker guessed that it wasn't Margaret, so it was probably Emily. She was wearing a light pink cardigan. She stopped, at the bottom of the step, and didn't come any closer until Jarod had turned off the lights.

When Jarod got out of the car, she gave him a hug. She offered Parker her attention, for a moment, perhaps looking for some injury, something to say she'd really been held captive by the Tower for all of a day, maybe less.

"Emily, is Dad with us?"

"Mmm."

He nodded. "Well, let's go in."

Parker followed behind them.

"Oh, thank goodness!" were the first words out of Margaret's mouth when she appeared in the hall ahead of them, but she wasn't looking at Jarod, she was looking at Parker.

"She wasn't harmed," Jarod reported, and Parker wanted to snipe back, "How would _you_ know, idiot? Just because I told you I was fine doesn't mean they didn't _do_ something to me!" She didn't. She said nothing.

She fixed a glance Emily's way. The woman looked paler than usual. A cold, perhaps? She was holding her arms wrapped about her, now, and whether she'd even realised this, or not, Parker couldn't say, because she made no move to remove her arms, to make herself appear at ease, relaxed, in the newcomer's presence. Or maybe she just didn't go in for that bullshit; maybe she thought lying would be worse than the act itself, than feeling pissed at her for being the frickin' enemy.

_An honest woman_, Parker thought. _How refreshing._ It wasn't often that you saw those, when you worked in the business she did. An honest woman, but still an angry one, she reminded herself. And angry people did stupid, angry things.

For a moment, Emily allowed herself to lean back against the wall, as though tired, and, though the other mightn't have noticed - she was standing practically on the wall, as it was - _Parker_ noticed. Yes, something was off with her.

"_It happens to be true._" She didn't realise she'd said anything 'til Jarod turned, frowning.

"What?"

She shook her head, couldn't think of anything to say to cover up. She didn't really care, either.

Jarod's frown deepened, but he accepted her non-reply and went on ahead, after his mother.

Looking at her, Parker thought that Emily looked familiar, but part of her defended, yeah, she'd seen the woman before; from afar, but nonetheless. A part of her didn't need more evidence, but another part of her said, wait, she _does_ look familiar: she looks like Silvana. And then she remembered: the first time Debbie had introduced her to Silvie, in her teens, she'd thought the girl so like her dead friend, Mimi, that it had nearly broken her heart, and yet, she hadn't allowed it to show. Not one bit of it. But now it was the other way around. It wasn't Silvie reminding her of Mimi, it was Emily reminding her of Silvie. Of the girl she was so sure to be her dead friend's daughter. In a flash of realisation, she felt like she'd been struck dumb - oh, how fucking stupid had she been? Yes! _Yes!_ Silvie _was_ Mimi's daughter, _was_ Roslin Morgan's daughter - Silvie's surname was Morgan - and so, too, was she Lyle's daughter. That was the reason Silvie talked to him, the reason she'd nicknamed him Lucky - a nickname Debbie had taken to calling him, when talking about him in front of those she didn't want to know she was talking about Psycho - they had the same eyes, the same shape. She was from Canada, where Mimi and she had attended boarding school; she had that badge - her dad's - that said _I Heart Nebraska_. And Debbie, her best friend, had a silver shooting star pin, just like Mimi had had (a gift from her dad). Where Debbie had got hers, Parker had never asked. But it reminded Parker of the inscription on the back of Mimi's pin, the two letters, almost like an initial: _ER_.

Parker forced herself to keep walking, when Jarod and Margaret headed for the kitchen, left Emily to fall in behind her; didn't turn around and throw her arms around Jarod's sister, _her best friend_! And the reason she was sick was because Lyle was, because Sunny wasn't Lyle's Convergence partner: Emily was. _Keep walking, Parker. Keep flippin' walking._

Was she just insane, or did her train of thought have some merit? Could Emily have been Mimi? She watched Margaret asking Jarod if he was hungry, if he'd eaten anything for dinner, and she suddenly remembered: Margaret's last name had once been Cooper, just as Mimi's had, before she'd married Charles Russell: MLC, My Lucky Charm; Catherine's best friend in boarding school: Maggie 'Lucky Charm' Cooper. How had it gone, in the old days: the one with the red hair, the one with the brunette hair, the one with the fair hair. Yes, Charles's sister, Edie. Edna Raines. They'd all been something of a group, back then. Before the kids. Margaret, Catherine, Edna. Friends.

It _was_ Cooper.

_Charming tells me I must stop sending casseroles round hers. She can't possibly eat all of that food. I don't see why not: a pregnant woman has to eat for two, after all. That is what they all say. Yet, I suppose Kaylene will be pleased the daily casserole will be seeing the ax. I think I should tell her in the morning, however. Let her stew just a little bit longer. I know I shouldn't, but I can't say how unsettled it makes me to see another woman smiling so in my own home, and Kaylene has been smiling more, of late. I suppose I'm just blue. With Maggie expecting, it would be such a delight if I, too, was to conceive. Just to think: our children would surely be the best of friends! But, I fear something is wrong. Were the feeling any stronger, I swear, it would sting and smart. It feels as though there's something wrong with ME. I haven't shared these thoughts with anyone - just you and I, journal - but the fear is still there, gnawing at my insides, and it just cuts me inside to see Kaylene so blissfully happy, as her eyes sometimes look, when that certain shine comes upon them. Oh, Charming, have I done something to wrong you, have I lost my lucky charm? Was it my taking of Edna's side, when your Charlie was so vexed with her hubby? Oh, that William! You must know he brings it upon himself. It's all very amusing, to him. He does it for the attention, dear. As an only child, I'm sure it's just that he's looking for some brotherly attention, as Charles, his brother-in-law, might provide. With the proper provocation, of course. Oh gee, I hope everything's okay. One day, Maggie, our children will be friends. I swear it!_

"And you, dear, are you hungry?"

"Thank you. Please. I'm starved."

Margaret frowned at her son as though to say, "Haven't you been feeding her, then?"

He shrugged, nonplussed.

A scraping of wood made Parker look 'round. Emily took a seat at the table, drawing a bowl of mandarines toward her, to peel.

Margaret appeared in front of her, on the other side of the table, leaning over, reaching for the bowl. "You don't have to do that, sweetie."

With a blank stare, Emily replied, "No. I want to."

Margaret sighed and straightened.

Jarod frowned, watching his sister, now, as though noticing, for the first time, that something was off with her. "Emily, are you okay?" In a low voice, he asked, "Are you upset that I brought Miss Parker here?"

"Yes. No."

"What?"

"I'm okay. I'm not upset. I want to peel mandarines."

Sounding somewhat unsure, Jarod said, "Okay." Something was definitely wrong.

"Is Ethan around?" Parker asked, now.

Margaret nodded. "I'll take you through, dear." She gestured a hand ahead of her.

As she was about to leave, Emily stuck out her hand, offering her the peeled mandarine. Frowning, Parker took it. "Th-thanks."

Emily said nothing, but went on with the task of peeling.

"She's been acting out of sorts, lately," Margaret told her quietly, as they left the room, a small frown etched into her forehead, and Parker wondered why she was being told this. Why was Margaret talking to her, at all? Why was she not... glaring? Or... something?

In the lounge, Ethan got to his feet. "Sister, you live!"

Parker couldn't help it, then. She laughed.

Ethan, seeming not to understand why she was laughing, smiled too. But she hadn't meant to laugh at him out of meanness; she was laughing because... he was a little bit adorable. Oh, he'd been worried for her (just as she'd imagined he would, all along)!

"Yes, I do," she said, a smile coming to her face. "And I am so, so happy for that!"

"I'm happy, too," Ethan told her. "It's good to see you."

"It's good to see you."

He smiled again.

Gemini stood up. "Hey. Lookin' lively."

"And thank goodness for that!" she agreed. She was surprised when Ethan hugged her.

Gemini smiled. _He doesn't bite. He's a pretty good guy, really. But I guess you already knew that, eh? We're all sorta glad you're okay. Jarod could have some real dishrag types lookin' for him, if it weren't for you._

Parker couldn't help a frown from forming on her face. Jarod's clone was telepathic? When had this happened? H-how? She quickly wiped it off, before Ethan caught sight of it, and offered him a smile.

_It's not everyone. Just a few. An old friend's parting gift, I fear. Oh, but you can never tell. Someday, well, we may very well meet again! That would be a happy moment, indeed. Oh yes! But, back to business. As I say, I haven't been able to extent this ability to my family members. It is just you, and my friend. I believe there is some sense, to that, some logic, but it is yet to reach me: it's taking its time, but when it arrives, it will be well worth it. Starlight. Pure starlight. You are well though? You're truly unharmed?_

_Yes_, Parker imparted. _Unharmed._

_I see. That is good._

_Yeah._

_Oh Gods_, she thought, just to herself, _not another secret. 'Cause this one's gonna blow some of 'em outta the water._ "And how have you been, these last few months?" she asked her younger brother.

"Aw, pretty average. I guess things have been pretty average for me."

Emily came in with the bowl of mandarines, offered one to Ethan and Mo.

"Tah," Mo said, taking a mandarine, but Ethan placed a hand over hers, meeting her eyes.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"I'm okay," she said, a little blankly.

"And why don't I buy that, at all?" Ethan asked, surprising Parker, but not Emily.

She didn't blink; her expression remained unchanged. She merely held Ethan's gaze. Took a mandarine from the bowl without looking, held it out for him, placed it into his hand when, finally, he brought his hand up to accept the offering.

"You're not well, Em. Please, go, lie down."

"No, I'm okay."

"You're not okay," Ethan protested.

She didn't protest back.

Margaret walked back in. "Emily, Hubertus has woken up."

Emily placed the bowl down on the coffee table and walked out.

"Who's Hubertus?" Parker asked, when Margaret had gone, too.

"Emily's son," Ethan told her.

"Hubertus?"

"Yes."

Parker glanced at the door, then back to Ethan. "Do I get to meet Daddy, then?"

Ethan shrugged. "I suppose you may, one day. We've yet to meet him, also."

Parker frowned. "Right."

"Jean-Paul," a woman whispered, into her ear, standing very close behind her. Parker could feel the warmth radiating from her through her clothes. "His name's Jean-Paul. Well, that's what I call him. We don't know his name, Emily won't say, but they're something of an item."

Parker shot Ethan a funny look, then turned 'round to meet this personal space-invading woman, stepping backward, as she did. She was about Margaret's age, she decided. Younger, perhaps, but about the same age. Dark hair, blue eyes. Pale-ish.

"Jean-Paul isn't real," Ethan said, by her side. "He's a figment of Harm's imagination. She's a writer. A romance writer."

Harm laughed. "Oh, a figment of my imagination, is it, now?"

"That's right. That's what he is," Ethan returned.

"And Hubertus? Is he also a figment of my, of _our_, imaginations?"

Ethan looked annoyed. "Hubertus is real, but Jean-Paul is pure fiction. Face it, Harmony, you're always looking for stuff that's not there: romantic plot lines that just don't exist."

"Romantic- Romantic plot lines!" Harmony laughed. "Believe me, honey, Jean-Paul isn't remotely romantically-minded!"

"I see," Ethan replied, clearly not believing a word she said.

Emily walked back into the lounge, carrying a baby.

Parker stared at him, resisting the urge to inch over there. She was sure he was her nephew. Lyle's son, at least. A baby brother for Reagan! The boy would be so pleased. But why a child? Why now? Was it their Convergence, because Lyle's upgrades were coming to their end stages, because he was dying?

Mo joined Emily on the sofa and smiled at Hubertus. "How you feelin', little one?" he asked the baby, who reached a hand in his direction, his movements all jerky. "Greetings, Earthling," Mo told him, and offered a finger for the little thing to hold onto.

"Oh, would you refrain from saying such things, Mo," Emily asked, tired and slightly irritated. "He's not an Earthling, he's just a baby. A person."

Mo dropped the grin, met her eye. "No probs, Em. Of course I will."

"Thank you, Geronimo."

His smile was a little tighter, the second time around.

Jarod strode over. "Oh good, the little one's up. Heya, baby!"

Emily sighed. "I'm sorry, Mo," she said, as though Jarod hadn't spoken. "I've just been so tired lately. I know it's no excuse - there is no excuse for shortness with another - but it's all that I can offer. And to ask for your forgiveness?"

With an uncomfortable frown, Mo nodded. "Of course, Emily. Of course. It's already done. I understand. I wasn't offended, you know. You don't want to confuse him; that's understandable."

Jarod merely frowned, smiled at Hubertus, and turned and left, once more.

"He does that," Ethan shared, drawing Parker's glance. "Just comes in to look at him." He didn't add any more, but Parker knew he was listing off the reasons behind this behaviour in his mind: 1) to make sure he hadn't been taken, 2) to make sure he was okay, he wasn't sick; 3) to make sure he was okay, he hadn't developed any strange, inexplicable abilities.

Emily sighed heavily and regained her feet. "I think we'll be off to bed, now," she said, and wandered away.

"Goodnight," Mo called after her.

Ethan merely nodded, though she didn't turn to see this.

She walked out without offering a reply, walking slowly but managing not to stumble.

"Goodnight," Parker whispered.

Ethan touched her arm. "I should show you to the guest room."

"Thank you, Ethan." She leant over, picked up the bowl with the mandarines, deposited of them on the kitchen table quickly, before rejoining Ethan in the hallway. "Lead the way!"

"Thanks for that."

"Don't mention it."

When Ethan had shown her the guest room, she returned to the kitchen for something to eat, and was joined by Margaret, a couple of minutes later, who sat down for a cup of chamomile tea.

"The Major's not here?" Parker asked, putting her spoon down, for a moment.

"No. No, Charles's here."

"Thanks for heating something up for me," Parker said.

"Oh, that's okay."

.

Rumer's _Am I Forgiven_ was playing over the radio, in the kitchen, in the morning. The morning light made Emily's vibrant red hair dull and sad. Parker wanted to go over, hug her, cheer her up, but, of course, she didn't.

She poured herself a coffee from the plunger, sat down with her cup and took a sip. It wasn't bad, strictly speaking.

Duffy's _Keeping My Baby_ came on. Emily brushed a tear from her cheek silently.

Parker set her cup down, stood up and got a mug down from the cupboard. She poured a cup of coffee, took it 'round to Emily. "Here you go, darl."

Emily glanced up at her slowly, slowly lowered her gaze again, wrapped her hands around the outside of the mug. "Thank you, Harmony," she whispered quietly.

Parker didn't pick her up on her error. Instead, "Not at all."

.

"The Tower nut was wrong. Shows how well he knows his stuff, doesn't it! The 'first successful prototype implemented on any living being that didn't kill that being', my hot tush! It was my brother who was stronger than they-"

Jarod clicked his fingers. "You're right, Parker. Your brother was strong; he did survive the upgrades. It is said they were different, after; that they had changed. As if Noah, himself, had somehow connected with their living component and come to an agreement, a co-operation, of sorts. In the process of navigating this co-operation, he'd gotten hurt, but he'd survived. Somehow, the damages had healed. He _is_ strong. Perhaps, he is still alive." He frowned, glanced at Parker. "So, you'll admit: it's possible that Noah could be your twin?"

Parker shrugged a shoulder. "I don't know, really. I've never even seen a picture of him. I have no Goddamn idea what he even _looks_ like."

"No, not many people do," Jarod admitted.

"But you do?"

Jarod nodded silently, then added, "He looks like you."

"What?"

"He looked like you, Parker. Noah looked like you."

"Like me?" She couldn't help the tone of pure scepticism in her voice; frankly, she didn't believe him.

"Sydney has a DSA Jacob stole from the Archives, b-before the 'accident'."

"And you've watched this DSA _together_?" she asked.

"No. No. It was-"

"Before?" she finished for him, anger tinting her voice, suddenly. "Then you knew? You knew, all along, that Lyle wasn't my brother? You knew he couldn't possibly be my fucking brother, because here was this other kid - this dead kid - who was the spitting image of me, the same Goddamn age an' everything, and you just let me _go on thinking_ that _freak_ was my _twin_! You even encouraged me to think it!"

Jarod sighed, raising a hand. "I had a suspicion, but this is the Centre we're talking about, and, frankly, they're capable of many things; many, many sick things."

"What are you saying?" she snapped.

"That Noah and Ethan may not be your only brothers."

She snorted. "Lyle doesn't even _look_ like me!"

"No. But that's the thing. He does look like someone you may be familiar with, though."

Parker laughed hysterically. Oh ha-ha! And who was that?

"Ben."

"Miller?" Parker asked incredulously.

"That's the one. They could be identical twins, were they closer to one another in age."

Parker snorted, rolled her eyes. "Well, maybe they are. Lyle's a Reaper, remember. Though he goes on about how he's not able to Heal himself, perhaps it wasn't always like that. Perhaps he's older than he says, he's just gone through a regenerative cycle. As a teenager, Bobby is recognisable as Lyle, but Bobby, as a young boy, not really. So what's going on here, really? It just came to me, a few minutes ago, but what if... what if something happened to Lyle, something that artifically induced the regeneration phase, and, afterward, he realised that he wouldn't just be able to rock up and carry on with his old life as before, so he found himself a new life. Or stole someone else's, after he'd had dinner, of course. We know he does that, eats other people, and he is a Reaper."

"But eating someone's kid, Parker? A bit distasteful, don't you think?"

She shrugged a shoulder. "Me, I think that one would do anything to survive. And how else would you explain the change in his appearance?"

"He was growing up. Everyone goes through changes growing up."

She snorted.

"And don't you think his parents would have noticed if their child had been replaced by an imposter?"

Parker shook her head, grinning. She lifted a finger. "No, you see, he's the really clever part. He's an _Em_path, Jarod. Can anyone say 'empathic glamour'?"

"Oh, don't! I'm thinking he's Ben's son, your half-brother, perhaps."

"But are _you_ forgetting? Ben's _not_ my father! _Raines_ is!"

"Says he is," Jarod replied.

"Oh, right, and what about the tests?"

"What about them? The tests also said that Lyle was your twin. Tests can be manipulated, falsified. You know that, Parker."

Parker laughed, but a quiet voice whispered to her: yes, tests _could_ be falsified, manipulated. And they whispered a name, too: _Annie_, they said. And then, a different name, but the same. Many names. _Many names_, Bobby had said. _The Daughter of Nash_, the voice told Parker.

She stopped laughing. "I do," she replied coldly.

And this was how it was; all of this stuff, this stuff she'd never asked for (not really), bleeding through, still bleeding through. It wasn't as she had thought, that Bobby had accidentally handed her all of it on a silver platter, perhaps without even realising it, himself: the connection was still there, still there, and she felt it waning, had been feeling it waning since that first moment: that first moment she'd left that place, running for her life. No, before then. Before then, even.

She just hadn't realised it.

So there was a connection between them, of some form. As much as she'd tried to deny it, there was something there: something that she hadn't started, wasn't aware had even existed. Somehow, Lyle had gotten through her barriers without her knowing, to form a connection. But why? How? And if he had managed it, what had he done with it, been doing with it? How had he been using their connection, what information had he been garnering from her? And why had he never used this connection against her? What had he been waiting for? Did he have some last, great betrayal hidden up his sleeve?

She scowled to herself, suddenly full of boiling, dark anger. She didn't let on to Jarod, however. This was something she'd have to investigate herself.

A knock on the door had Jarod marching for the door, reaching for the handle. "Mom."

"Lunch is ready, sweetheart. You think you could come out, for a couple of minutes, and eat something?"

"Of course."

Parker walked over, slipped past him, out the door. Offered Margaret a nod. _Heya, Momma!_

"Is she okay?"

"I don't know, Mom."


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer** I don't own Duffy's song, _Girl_, its music or lyrics.

* * *

><p>"Rehema, sir. The boy's name is Rehema. I'm told it's African."<p>

"It would seem that way." After a moment of contemplation, the other man added, "He's a Horizon job."

"You think so, sir?"

"I'm sure of it, Osgood."

"Very good, sir."

The other waved a hand, indicating that he was done with him; he should leave.

Osgood obeyed, at once, heading straight for the door, no dillydallying involved. _A Project Horizon number, then?_ he thought, as he walked. _A GM baby, eh?_ He'd arrived at the right time, it seemed. Things were about to get interesting, very interesting.

Back in the office, Florentine Phelps walked to his polished oak desk, reached for his telephone. People would need to hear this, know this, higher-ups. But first, the med team who were attending the boy. They'd need to up the kid's sedatives. He'd easily work it off, at the level they'd dosed him, then he'd slip through their fingers, too, as the woman had.

That was not an option.

.

"Horizon? Shit, you sure, man?"

"We've still to run the tests, sir, but I'm fairly certain he's a Horizon cook-up, yes. The way he took care of those Tower Sweepers, sir; if you'd only _seen_ it, you'd understand."

"Mmm." The man nodded. "Get those tests done ASAP."

"Of course, sir."

The man narrowed his eyes in calculation. "I don't like it, though; I don't like it, at all. The Swedish aren't ones to be messed with, as you know."

"Yes, sir."

"They're... resourceful. Do you think they're the ones who organised this, then? Do you think - could it be, the woman's with them, now?"

"I wouldn't be able to say, sir."

A shake of the head. "No, of course not."

"Let's just pray they're not in league with South Africa."

The man hissed, a sharp intake of breath. "Good God, man! Don't scare me like that! South Africa! That's all we need! For them to get their grimy hands on Noah once more. You know they're not partial to sharing."

"Yes, sir. My apologies, sir."

"Yes, well, I think I'll have to think about this. And, by God, man, those tests! Those tests are vital!"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, what's the hold up? Off you go!"

A nod, and the man was away. Shit, he hated how that guy treated him like some Goddamn tea boy! Hated the way he called him 'man', but expected to be addressed as 'sir', in return! Bloody disgusting! He pulled the door closed, after him, thinking silently, _Winters, you bastard, I hope you drop dead!_

.

She would not be returning until this business with the Tower had been sorted. Parker knew this without Jarod having to tell her, yet he did, anyway. If Raines didn't work something out with them, it would be up to Courtland. And if Raines pointed out the many reasons that this would be a big mistake, then perhaps she'd never be allowed back. She was seething. Raines wouldn't Goddamn _dare_!

She- she was a Parker. She belonged with the Centre. It would be too... too cruel for him to take it from her now, after all she'd sacrificed for it. It was all she had now. Her job, her home. Unspeakably cruel, and yet, totally Raines.

.

On the second night, this was his dream, and, yet, even he knew it was more than a simple, innocent dream:

On the other end of the connection, he could hear someone playing some bright, get-up-and-dance, boppin' tunes, but, judging by her voice, he figured it certainly hadn't been Silvie who'd put it on. Debbie, then, he supposed. His baby girl, Silvie's best friend.

"He's getting better, I heard," Broots volunteered. It was true. Sydney had told him this.

Silvie sniffed.

"You're doing okay, though, aren't you?"

Another sniff, mixed up with a half-laugh.

"Debbie's 'round, I take it."

"No. I put that on for Jethro."

"Je-?"

"You said you'd like that name."

_Yeah, I did. I-it's a boy! The baby's a boy!_ For a moment, he thought he might choke, or cry, but then he just felt... numb. Didn't know why, didn't want to; couldn't help it. Why couldn't he feel... just _something_? At once, he decided that he hated it, detested it: this numb feeling inside. He wouldn't tell Silvie, though.

"I want to hit him! He's so stupid! He just expects me to take it - expects us _all_ to take it - and move on, as if nothing's changed! The sun's still gonna come up, tomorrow. 'We don't really die, funny. We just go back home.'" She laughed harshly. "He's a big fucking idiot! He doesn't get it at all! He might be going back home, but where does that leave _me_, where does that leave Debbie, the rest of us? Does he even care, the jerk?"

"He's going to be okay," Broots interrupted, trying to sound soothing, reassuring.

She laughed, started crying. "Oh, I know! And then, he'll forget us! We'll have the memories, and that's all we'll have. _I'm not ready to let go of my Dad!_"

"Silvie-"

The line disconnected. He looked down at his cell phone's little glowing screen, feeling tears welling in the back of his eyes. Jeez, Silvie could be so selfish, sometimes! He closed his eyes, told himself that this feeling would pass, that Silvie would get better; they'd get better.

He opened his eyes again, tried calling Debbie. She must have been at work, the phone switched off; the connection went straight to her Message Centre:_ You've reached Debbie Broots's cell. Leave a message or text me and I'll... probably get back to you._ (A laugh)_ No, yeah, jus' kidding, I'll definitely get back to ya! Leave me a mess', kay, cos I love those._

He cut the connection, put his phone away. He'd just have to try again later.

It was everything that they'd never say to one another.

.

They had run the DNA tests six times, thus far, and each time, they produced the same result. Rehema was a Horizon baby, alright. He was definitely... changed. More than a mere clone.

There was a feeling of excitement, but something else, too: fear.

.

Parker sat in the lounge, in front of a flickering TV set, the morning news on mute, Toploader playing over the stereo. _Lady Let Me Shine_. She couldn't even think about the song, all she could think was how she was suffocating here, dying here.

What would become of her now?

.

She'd said some unkind things, she'd been bitchy, but she couldn't bring herself to regret her words, her choices. She'd had good reason, for God sake! She'd had _every_ bloody reason!

.

"You can't go back there, Parker. You know that."

She shook her head. "Raines'll work something out with the Tower."

"That's always assuming he wants to. Did you ever think maybe he's happy you're out of the picture? Out of _his_ way."

She scoffed. "Bullshite!"

"No, not bull_shit_, Parker. He's got free reign, then."

"I'm not fuckin' Catherine!" Parker scowled. "I've never rescued no fuckin' kids! I've never even tried!"

Jarod sighed. "But you were difficult, reluctant to fit the mould they'd set out for you. You'd have headed that way, in the end. This way, he's rid of you and he hasn't even had to get his hands dirty; he hasn't even had to off you. And if you truly are his daughter, if he really believes that you are, he's bound to see this as an added bonus: so maybe you guys don't agree on everything, but he hasn't been such a bad Dad. He let you live, after all."

"Big mistake!" she snarled.

"Parker, you'll stay away from that guy," Jarod told her, fixing a steady gaze to hers. "If anyone's going to take care of him, it'll be me."

She laughed, eyes glinting darkly. "Bastard!"

"That's right, I'm a bastard, for wanting you alive. I'm a real fuckin' bastard."

She laughed, turned and walked out of the room. Yeah, he was! Glad to bloody hear he knew it.

.

Here was something she hadn't known, and Jarod had. The company had been pretty pissed at Lyle for wasting Kyle. So, okay, _pretty_ was a bit of an understatement, but they'd given him a choice, a chance to redeem himself. They had this thing where they offered their services to some choice people and organisations free-of-charge; 'making good' it was called, officially: 'pulling the wool over the eyes', unofficially. Yeah, they were the good guys! No, really.

They were quite proud of their cunning little scheme, actually, but they'd been stuck for participants, and then, who would happen to land in their sights but a Pretender. A real Pretender! They'd been all excited until they'd discovered that he wasn't a Pretender; just a Class Five Empath. But, hey, even _that_ they could work with. So they'd set to work and come up with something, something truly genius! Something sure to please the Empath, they were certain.

When it came to missing kids, nobody could knock you if you brought one home alive. Nobody could do anything but thank you, love you. And look to you, once more, when another one went missing. Plenty of kids in a country as big as the USA, plenty going missing everyday. And what was an Empath good for if not for finding missing children.

And so, that was how it began.

And, for once, here was something the Empath could do; here was something that pleased them. Gosh, who'd have thought.

And now, their Empath wasn't looking too well, too happy.

But what did any of that matter to her? Parker thought. Not at all. It didn't matter to her, in the least; meant nothing at all, to her.

Jarod seemed to find it interesting, however. Which was why he'd told her, apparently. Had it been missing kids they'd been looking for, or kids they'd been missing?

Parker couldn't bring herself to care; wasn't Cats, she told herself, but it wasn't that, at all. It was more and it was less; it was everything and it was nothing. It was just... a part of her was dying.

And how to reconcile with that? How to reconcile with something that was dying that you'd never known, that you'd always known? How to reconcile with the end, the beginning, again?

Did you reconcile these things, understand and accept them, or did they merely exert their will over you, bend you to their favourite shape, if you didn't bend yourself first, in order to counteract their little game? Did you live, only live, or did you soar, shine, excel, reorganise, reshape, relive, rise above? Move on?

How did you suddenly find yourself alone? Alone, but not alone?

_You don't go_, she thought fiercely. _I am the first-born and I say 'no'. You don't go._

Or maybe she only thought of thinking this.

.

Nicholas turned in his chair, away from his desk, toward the window behind him, the view of the sky, sun still in it, still shining. _Surely it can't be that time already?_ he thought. _You're young still. So young. Don't you see?_

Sun, shining warm. He felt the sunlight on his face, warming his cheeks. An icy winter day, out there, but the sun, still there, still there; still warm.

He closed his eyes, and a little of the warmth died. He stayed like that, facing the window, the sun warming his cheeks, until a knock on the door drew him back towards the world, again, back down to Earth, and the way things were, a job to do.

He opened his eyes, got up from his chair, turned the chair back to face his desk, walked to the door. "Come in."

.

A smile brightened Emily's face, glimmered in her eyes, a happy, hopeful whisper escaping her lips, "Don't think this is the last time!"

.

Silvie sat on her couch and cried. No-one else around, no-one to put an arm around her shoulders, hold her close, say 'it's gonna be alright, baby girl'. No-one at all. And gone, gone. She knew there wouldn't be any special goodbyes. Gone really meant gone. You don't say 'goodbye' unless it's really goodbye, and if it was, and you couldn't believe it, wouldn't buy it, then it would be an ill omen to say it. So, no, you kept your mouth shut, and said nothing. Said, "I hope you smile, baby. I truly do. Love your smile, too. Do, I do. Go on, you!"

On the coffee table, lay her journal, opened to a fresh page, only someone had already written something there, and it said: _I hope you smile..._

The pen reached the edge of the coffee table, fell to the floor. Joined her tears there.

.

Fulton frowned at the mess lying on the floor, supposed to be on the desk, sighed heavily. "You're in a good mood," she observed, but Raines didn't bother to reply to that.

Just snapped, "What do _you_ want?"

"A word with the Director? He in, you think?"

"What the fuck do you want, Fulton?"

She frowned, leant back a bit, pretended to look impressed. "My, you _are_ in some mood."

Was shocked when a tear ran down his cheek and he replied, quietly, "Not in the mood, sorry."

"I'm sure she's fine," Fulton told him. "She's a tough thing. She can stand on her own two feet. And, if I... if I can speak honestly, I don't think, if they should cross paths, some day, no, Jarod, he wouldn't hurt her. They're old friends, aren't they. And old friends, well, they just want to be friends again. I think she'll be happy out there in the wide world."

She watched Raines wipe his tears away and meet her eyes, tried to guess what he'd say. And failed miserably when he said, "Fulton, do you mind if I hold you?"

Couldn't help but thinking, _Is that a rhetorical question?_ Thought about saying, "No, bugger off!" Said, instead, "Who's it gonna hurt?" In the end, it wasn't even as bad as she'd thought it would be.

_Hugphobia, that's what you've got_, she thought to herself, _but it's silly really; hugging's not so bad, not so bad, at all; it's kinda warm, actually._

Well, it wasn't so bad until Courtland walked in, shadowed by his PA. The PA looked away, as though hugging was lewd, now, but the Chairman coughed and stood on something that cracked loudly. "What's this mess?"

"Must've been an earthquake, sir," Fulton replied, with a liberal dose of sarcasm, earning a snipey look from the PA, Marcia.

"Or a volcano, perhaps?" the Chairman mocked.

She shrugged. "Solar tsunami?"

Courtland laughed, not in the least amused.

"I'm kidding," she drawled. "Conflict resolution, sir. We're brainstorming ideas for a workshop on conflict resolution, for the Med Space staff, sir."

"Brainstorming, is it?"

"Quite so, Mr. Chairman, sir."

He snorted. "I have something to discuss with Dr. Raines," he told her, "so you might want to," shook his head, "take five, get a coffee, I don't know. Go. Just... go."

Fulton shot him a glare. Oh, wasn't he just the gentleman!

"If you please, Cherice," Raines spoke up.

She grimaced, picked the photo frame up from the floor, placed it back on the desk, though it was now quite ruined, the glass cracked in various places, sitting together flimsily, like a funny puzzle. "Director." She walked to the door, left the room.

.

She was waiting outside the office door, leant against the wall opposite, when the door opened again and the Chairman and his PA walked out, a paper cup in each hand. Neither spared her a glance, but went their own way. She walked to the door, offered Raines one of the coffees. "What did Mr. and Mrs. Brady want, then?"

Raines sighed, taking the cup she'd offered. "I'll have to go down to Commons and inform them of the news," he said. "You'd come with, if I asked?"

She shrugged. "I could. Assuming you told me first, what news. Is Miss Parker okay?"

"I don't know. I wouldn't have a clue. It's the other one."

"Mmm?"

Raines looked at the floor, didn't really know how to put it.

"That's too bad," Fulton told him, guessing what he might have had to say. "You expect the kids to outlive you, don't you?" She sighed. "And there's another one gone. Angelo, well, he didn't work out. Then there was Kyle. And now, Lyle too. Your son. It's too bad." She looked at her drink, looked back to Raines. "Of course I'll come with you. The child may need... a little consolation. Yes, yes. I'll come."

"Thank you."

She looked at her drink, didn't know what to say to that, really. Hadn't expected it, after her own words. She'd been a bit mean, she thought. Purposefully, of course. Of course. But, today, it seemed, the Director wasn't in the mood, just as he'd said.

Well, on an ordinary day, she might've been annoyed at him for using her first name when the boss had just walked in, thinking them sharing some sort of intimate moment, but, today, she was out of sorts, also; she'd just thought, _Go team!_ And it hadn't hurt that it had made Marcia very nearly flinch. Score!

.

"Yes, we know," was all Persephone had to say, and, Fulton, glancing past her, saw that the children - well, they weren't little kids anymore, they were growing up - were sitting together on the couch, huddled together, not saying anything but just there, just being there, for one another. She wasn't needed. A bit of a letdown, she thought.

"Is Angelo okay?" she asked.

Persephone sighed heavily. "He'll pull through. What choice does he have?"

Fulton nodded. "You're right."

"I know. I worry, though. What's the Tower going to make of this? What are they going to do? I won't have them taking my Empaths! I simply won't! Blue Cove deserves this! And I'll tell them that, too, if they ask. Now that Lyle's not around to put them back in their place, who's going to stick up for us? Oh, I wish I could say so, but I hold no pretence that that'll be the Chairman. He's only after one thing. Well, two, but what's the difference, really, in this society? Money and power, power and money. That's all that one's into. He won't have our backs. So what's going to happen here, what's going to happen to us now?"

"I've got your back, mermaid," Raines told her, drawing a bit of a funny look from Fulton. Wha-? Had he just called Merchant 'mermaid'? Well, wasn't that odd? She put the look away before either of the two could catch it and watched Persephone sigh, then nod.

"I know you have, Director," she replied back.

He nodded. "But it would be ever so nice to have a bit of support from the up-'n'-ups?"

"Ever so nice," she agreed. "But, my dear, they don't even see us."

"No, they never have."

She sighed. "There was once."

"And what a catastrophe that turned out to be!"

"Yes, indeed."

"Well, keep up the good work, doctor," Raines said finally. "We'll be off, if there's nothing more to be done."

"No, not currently. Fruit salad would be a Godsend, but there you have it, it's not fruit salad day, is it?"

Raines smiled. "Love, I think you're in luck: it just so happens that Fulton's a bit of an exemplar to the saying 'good things come in small packages' when it comes to fruit salad."

"Oh yes!" Fulton agreed quickly. "A whiz at it!" She made a fist of her hand, raised it up to chest height. "You can count on me, sarge!"

Persephone blinked, replied, "Good to hear... I think..."

Fulton nodded, turned and headed for the door. Okay, fruit salad! What? She stopped, in the hall, waited for Raines to catch her up. "Huh? Have you gone barmy, Raines? I can't make fruit salad!"

"Course you can, love. You can do anything if you've the will; you're a clever girl."

"I am not a _girl_!" she growled.

"Oh, but you are clever!"

She crossed her arms, glaring, looked away from him. "Well... maybe I am that."

Raines smiled.

She shot him another glare, walked off ahead. "I'll give it a go," she grumbled, "but I'm not making any promises."

.

Somehow, she'd got something together that looked halfway edible (well, they had, but now that it was done, she quite liked the idea of taking the credit - if it was crap, she'd blame Raines).

Reagan was as glum as ever, upon seeing the fruit salad, but Infinity seemed cheered by the sight of food (especially this food) and Kim tagged along with her brightening mood. Angelo didn't have anything to say about it, his expression was blank, not even glarey today.

Persephone served the fruit salad, invited Fulton and Raines to stay. Raines declined, but Fulton stayed, calling after him playfully, "Stick in the mud!"

Infinity cracked up, and Fulton even managed a smile of her own. Kim patted Fin's arms, smiled at her; offered a smile to Reagan, too, but Reagan wouldn't be pulled out of his down-in-the-dumps mood.

He still had a bowl of fruit salad, though, and Fulton thought that encouraging. She was kinda glad she'd stayed, actually.

.

With nothing else to do, she returned to Raines's office, in mind of offering a helping hand with the stuff he'd chucked to the floor, but, knocking on the door, she found that it had all been cleared away; the place was it's usual neat self, once more.

Raines was on the telephone, talking with Sydney, she supposed - he'd just said "Sydney" and she only knew one Sydney - so she closed the door after her and walked over to the chair in front of the desk and sat down.

Persephone was right, this current guy playing chairman wasn't about to stick up for any of them; they'd have to stick together, now, or else they'd been out on their backsides, or on the other end of a gun. Blue Cove had been teetering on the verge of closing down for years, the company undecided as to what to do with this outdated, dilapidated, basically useless branch. Any of the branches could get out there and look for Jarod, in reality, it was just that Blue Cove, as his home branch, had had first dibs. But now, things were starting to change again. There was no-one to make Blue Cove shine anymore, and, very soon, she'd likely die altogether.

Fulton just didn't like that idea, somehow. "_...You know you ought to know better. Why break my heart...?_"

Raines shot her a silent frown and nodded to something Sydney had told him over the phone.

Fulton sat forward and reached for the picture frame. This one was a different picture: this wasn't Edna, Annie and Sam; instead, it was Miss Parker. No more than five, Fulton guessed. She was smiling. A new picture frame. This one wasn't broken. She put the frame back on the desk and sat back, glancing at Raines.

.

Parker stared blankly at the television screen. Even when Jarod came in, sat next to her on the sofa, she didn't look 'round.

"He's gone, isn't he?"

"No, not really," she replied blankly. "Gone, now, yes, but everything he's ever done, every evil scummy thing, lives on, through us. It hardly even matters that he's gone."

Jarod sighed, glanced at the TV fleetingly. "Isn't that always the way, Miss Parker? But... he's gone, he's not going to be hurting anyone anymore. Nobody new. And you'll be able to... move on."

She laughed, her eyes too wide, but still fixed to the TV, though she wasn't watching it. "Yes, oh yes, you're so fucking right! Shit, you must be some genius! Because, after everything you went through at the hands of those scumbags, you just... let go, moved on. Oh yes - you did!" She glared at him now, suddenly, with eyes like midnight, and sharp, like knives. "You don't move on!" she breathed harshly. "You carry on, you carry all of it with you - all of the pain and torment and darkness! Don't you fucking get it, Jarod? You carry it with you, and it never stops hurting you - never! And sometimes, it hurts other people, too. People you care about. People you want to care about. Anyone who gets in your way, in the path of you and your pain!"

Jarod shook his head, looking sad. "Yes, you carry all of your life's experiences with you, I'll grant you that, but what you choice to do with them, how you handle them, is up to you. You can rise above your own personal pain, see the world differently, your experiences differently. You can let go of your anger. Some people believe that all of life, the very act of living, is suffering, is physically pulling something from you, demanding something, taking... getting you nearer and nearer to your inevitable demise, with nothing, no happiness, to show for it. But that's what we do: we live, we do things, go through things. And we choose how we see the world. But, ultimately, the truth remains the same, though we may not see it. We belong to the world, and the world to us, and we to the world. We are all one thing, one world, one part of a whole. Whether you choose conflict or co-operation, the world goes on; carries on.

"Yes, I've had a shitty life, in part, and yes, I'm really very angry about that, but that's done, that's gone, it's the past. And I don't want my future, my present, to be like that, too. I want to... to feel... better now. Not always this constant, continual anger, this feeling of If I don't strike first, someone else will, or, you know, They're the ones who started it, they did this, and, shit, I have every right to do the same to them back, to exact my revenge. What a load of nonsense! They had no - no, 'right' is the wrong word, but, for the sake of laziness, I'll, I'll go with it, for now - they had no right to do what they did to me, in the first place, so what right do I have to behave the same way, in return? It's an exercise in stupidity, in stepping so far out of... of everything and anything in this world, and, you know what, it's because they don't get it; they don't get that they're a part of this all, just as everyone is. That's not how they see the world. And that's why they can do the things they have. Because they're stupid and horrible and evil and... and they're so sad, so... They make me so sad, thinking about them, about everything they've never known, this... connection they've never felt, this side to life - this wonderful, wonderful side to life. And yet, you know what, they'll probably never feel it; they'll probably go their whole lives, never knowing that it's there, right there, so close they go reach out and grab it, all of this... togetherness, wholeness, all of this _love_! All of their lives, unloved. Couldn't even love themselves, wouldn't know how.

"And you know what, Mel? I won't be them! I won't live in a world without love! Because that isn't a world, that's a dark and lonely corner."

Parker laughed, suddenly. Then, "You've gotta stay away from that stuff, Jar. Too much of it, and it'll make you loopy."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Drugs," she said, with emphasis.

"I haven't taken any drugs."

She sighed. "Oh well."

"Don't you want to be happy, too?"

"I'm not forgiving that bastard!"

Jarod frowned. "Oh, come on. At least give him a chance to forgive himself. You never know, he might be a really nice... person, one day."

"He's dead!"

"One day, in another life."

She snorted. "Oh, so you believe in that claptrap?"

"Yeah, I think it's romantic."

"Romantic?" she scoffed.

"That's what I said."

"Romantic?"

"Yeah."

"You're insane."

"Thanks... I think." He smiled.

"Moron!"

"The idea of Heaven and Hell... Mmm, life just doesn't work like that. You make your own choices, in a way. I say 'in a way'. But, see, you don't stop making choices. So, Heaven and Hell, some people might find the notion rather comforting, but I think it's a little monochrome. Life just doesn't work like that, and if you're sentient enough to experience happiness or... or eternal agony and damnation, then you should definitely be considered alive, after a fashion, and... life just doesn't work like that. Not a very strong argument I've laid down, you might think so, but I can't seem to put it... quite the right way, I fear. It just doesn't sync, for me. So, no, I don't believe in Heaven and Hell. I believe in... in life, and making choices, and learning from our mistakes, and... and happiness."

"Cathy, you killjoy!" Parker muttered, under her breath. "Why don't you just get lost and... you know, like Jarod says, go find your own happiness!" She laughed sarcastically. "You are so on crack," she told him, and stood up and walked out.

"Well, that was a tremendous failure, Jarod. Better luck next time, I say, young man. Oh, stop talking to yourself, will you! It doesn't help anything, doesn't change the fact that it's someone else you really would rather be talking to. Nope, makes it worse, in fact. Cover up, or what?"

When he walked into the kitchen, where Parker had gone, she threw up her hands and declared, "And you don't get to meet your long-lost loved ones! How bloody _you_ is that, Jarod!"

"You may meet them again. Or you may not. But you can always make new friends, you can always love again. And, really, you won't even know you've done all this before, so it won't be a problem for you, if you're the sort of person who has a problem seeing the wonder in the small things, in the subtle nuances."

She laughed. "Can anyone say 'downer'?"

"Oh, I am not!"

"Oh, yes you are!"

"Says you," he replied, with a grin.

"Says anyone with half a brain!"

"Don't you mean, anyone with half a mind and an intellect to best utilise its capabilities, Parker? Because, the brain is just an organ. It does organ-y stuff. It's the mind that really shines, that loves, that feels hurt and pain."

"Shut up!" she scowled. "You'll hurt Sydney's feelings."

"Oh, come on, just because he's a psychiatrist doesn't mean he doesn't believe in the mind. He's an Inner Sense Possessor, Parker! How can he not?"

"A little thing called 'not allowed', in his profession," she replied, "'taboo'."

Jarod laughed. "Really, you should know Sydney's not like that; he's more progressive than that. He's Sydney, after all. Did you two even talk, in all those years you worked together? I mean, _really_ talk?"

"No," she snapped, "I don't really talk to anyone, moron! And you should know that!"

"No kidding," he agreed.

She threw a mandarine from the bowl on the table at him.

"What was that for?"

"Moron! I was being sarcastic, you idiot!"

"Oh? And here was me, thinking you were entirely serious. I was honestly taking your word for it. Hey, you can't blame me for listening when you talk. That's what everyone wants, isn't it? For someone to listen, when they talk?"

She snorted. "Shut up! You're supposed to be psychic! You should know when I'm having a bar of you and when I'm not!"

"I should know?" he asked, slightly disbelieving.

"Yes! That's bloody right!"

"And I'm just supposed to _know_?"

"You're a guy! Guy's are always supposed to know!"

"Okay, but before you go any further with that thought, how exactly am I supposed to _know_ this stuff about you, when I'm still getting my head around getting to know myself, so to speak?"

She made a face. "I don't care! Are you a guy, or what?"

"That's a bit mean," he pointed out, and she laughed, raising an arm and pointing at him.

"_You don't get to say that, idiot! You're a guy!_"

He nodded. "Point taken, Parker. There's a constant, pervading segregation between everyone and everything, in modern society today, and that's... that's not good. So, what do you say we don't perpetuate that same stupidity, eh?"

She stopped laughing. "I'm hungry. I can't think on an empty stomach! I need time to come to an informed decision, so get the fuck off my back, already. And give me back my mandarin."

He threw her the piece of fruit he'd, luckily, caught when she'd thrown it at him before.

She offered him a forced smile, and sat down.

"Parker?"

"What?" she growled, without looking at him.

"D'you want me to make something to eat?"

"Ha-ha! Guys can't cook."

"Ha-ha, this guy can."

She snorted. "Go for your life, then!" she muttered. "And we'll see who'll be the judge of that!"

"Can you two _not_ argue every time you open your mouths to talk to one another?" Ethan asked, appearing in the doorway.

"What would be the fun in that, then?" Parker asked supremely, from the table.

Ethan sighed. "Uh-huh," he replied. "You know what, sister? The fun would be all mine - as opposed to a splitting headache!"

"Oops," she muttered, then looked 'round at him. "Want me to peel you a mandarin? Jarod's making something he says will be edible, should be edible. Sit, have a glass of water. I swear, I won't diss him for," she looked at her watch, "at least ten minutes. Okay? For you, little brother."

Ethan laughed. "That's kind of you, my."

"_I know_," she replied, sounding astonished, herself. She stood up, walked over to Ethan and hugged him. "It's not so bad, you know. No, not really."

"Nope, only right now. In time, the pain will pass, the sun will come out from behind the clouds, again, and life will be wonderful again!" Ethan remarked sarcastically.

"Something like that," Parker told him, with a smile.

.

It was just that... they were all gone now: friends and family, the children: Sammy, Mel, Jarod and Kyle - years ago, now - even Lyle, and Persephone and Angelo, well, they existed, the same as he did, floating through the same void, dull void, there was no spark in their hearts anymore, no hope for tomorrow, and, he realised, that was mostly him, his fault, they'd lost their belief in him. He never was going to pick up where Cat had left off, rescue the wee tortured urchins. Never. Never. Never... It echoed in his mind like a dying breath. Oh, but that was him all over, wasn't it? Never. So _very_ him.

Sam'd gone away, gone to be with his Jane, the woman he'd decided to love, and now Miss Parker was out of the picture, too, through no want of her own - couldn't even save the kids, now - and her other half, who knew where that one was at?, who had ever known? If only he could do something for Angelo - for his _son_, for darn sake! - for Persephone, for the kids: Infinity, Kim, Reagan. But he was just old, just old, and he _felt_ it, he was tired, and alone, and he didn't have the energy for any of that, anymore. He didn't want any of it, anymore. Brother was gone, old friends gone, everyone and anyone - gone. So he thought, couldn't help thinking, _And when do I get to go? That's all I want now - please! Please, let me go!_

.

"Aren't you going to thank me?" Barb asked, with a smile that came over as more of a sneer than anything else. "I brought you back, monster!"

He ignored the smiling woman and glanced at the floor, at the Healer who'd brought him back - no, Barb, you didn't do anything but point your finger and say, "Get it done!" Like you've always done. Oh, except for that one time - dead, thought, _I did that. I did that, like I always do. Why did you bring me back? Why?_ But the time for questions was dead, lying cold on the floor. Well, not quite cold, still holding onto a little of the warmth of life, a little of the illusion.

"Get back," he told Barb, totally serious - she would want to stand back, well back - got down on the floor with Jamboree, still, just didn't care what Barb thought - this one did not die for _him_ - placed a hand on the side of her face as though he hadn't seen the blisters, the pain he'd caused her, right before she'd died. And then, he found her hiding place, and asked her to come back, come back please.

The smile wiped off Barb's face to be replaced by horror. The Healer - the Healer she'd paid so much for - was alive, coughing, as in 'not dead'. Sh-she hadn't been played, then. T-Corp hadn't sold her a dud, this one was the real deal. Holy shit! She laughed, though she still couldn't believe it. It was... it was fuckin' Ace!

"Oh, my dear, you - you were worth it!"

Jamboree didn't look at her, didn't seem to register the 'compliment', but stared at the guy knelt on the floor beside her.

"Are you okay?" he asked her.

"I... I think so," she replied. She was so confused. "Wh-what are you?"

"I think... they call us 'human'," he said, and smiled.

"But... you called me back!"

"Oh, but you - _you_ listened! You're wonderful!"

She frowned.

"Really not a pick-up line." He placed a hand over his heart. "Honestly." The warmth dropped out of his eyes, then, and he stood up, catching Barb's eye. "I'd like to rejoin my group now, if it's not too much of an inconvenience."

Barb stopped grinning. "No, that isn't going to happen, young man. You see, you're ours now."

"Oopsie! Hate to break it to you, reeeally do, but I'm nobody's possession!" With that, he snapped his fingers, and Barb collapsed to the floor, unconscious.

Jamboree stared at him, wide-eyed. "You're a Reaper."

"Oh, enough." He walked to the door, stopped for a moment. "Nice meeting you, by the way, circumstances aside." He nodded and disappeared, out the door.

"The same, to you... I think..." she replied, but he'd already gone. Her eyes travelled across the floor, to Barb, and she stood up and walked over to her, sitting down at her side. For a moment, Jamboree's eyes turned white, and that moment was long enough to know that Barb would be alright, no lasting damage done. Her eyes returned to normal, and she suppressed a sigh.

A Reaper and an Empath, she thought. Must have been, to stroll right by the guard outside the door without their noticing. A high-Class Empath, too. Which was odd, for Blue Cove. Ever since the Pretender had slipped off into the night, one evening, they'd been a bit... dull, everyone said. Still, can't have been doing too badly for themselves if they had this one under their thrall. She frowned. If only she'd been told his name, that might have leant her some clues, but they just didn't seem to think it of much importance for her to know the names. _Clues, clues_, she thought, _what do you know?_ Ah, yes, that one was part of Jarod's Retrieval team, that was right. Likely because he wasn't a half-bad Empath, she deduced, but that really told her no more than she'd already known. He would hardly have been anyone important, or else he'd not have been assigned to tracking duty. He had to be just a regular employee, nobody with any position to contest the Chairman's position. And Courtland didn't have kids... Ah! But the former Chairman had had, she reminded herself. That's the key: that one was a Parker, and he'd stayed with Blue Cove because, once upon a time, Blue Cove had been his family's pride and glory, theirs.

So that was why.

.

"Homesick yet?"

Broots clapped a hand to his chest, eyes wide with startle. "You're- You're supposed to be dead!" he finally got out.

"Nah. Tried that, found it rather... boring. Decided to pop back, see how the old 'team' was farin'? So, how are ya?"

"In the process of having a heart attack!" Broots quipped darkly.

Lyle shrugged. "No time for that, old chap! There's much too much to be done still."

Broots made a face. "Could you..."

"Hmmm?"

"You're not British!"

"I'm channelling Brigitte, yeah."

Broots shot him a glare.

"No?" Lyle sighed. "Totally over it. 'Ow's that sister of mine, then?"

"Missing."

"Missing, now, is it?"

He got another glare. "The Tower took her!"

"A regular Rapunzel, I see. Except, not really."

"Tower Twenty-nine!"

"My goodness."

"Don't you remember? That's how you got shot? Being an idiot again!"

Lyle smiled. "Do I get a... gold star, for... that?"

"Piss off!"

"I am rather good at it. You must admit."

"Where's Parker?" Broots growled.

"Ah... I dunno."

"_You're the Empath, you imbecile!_"

"My word. Someone's 'avin a bad day. Alright, alright, I'll give it a shot, what's about 'at?" He sighed, closed his eyes. Opened them again, a moment later. "I'm kinda hungry. Are you hungry?"

Broots glared daggers at him.

"I'm jus' saying, sheesh. No need to... murder me with your eyes. It's a good thing you're not a Reaper, eh."

Broots grabbed the lamp from the bedside table. "I've still got this!"

Lyle laughed. "There's a good human, eh." He put his hand up. "I'll try again, yeah, but just you put that thing back where you took it from. The Tower's got their own Empaths, you know. Bunches and bunches of them, like a whole flower shop o' them. I'm just one person. I'll try, but I can't guarantee you anything. Fair enough, Dad?"

Broots scowled, but put the lamp back. "I'm not your fuckin' Dad!"

"No. I should think not." Lyle walked over to the bed and sat down and closed his eyes again. "I dunno," he said, finally, opening his eyes again. "The girl's done vanished right off of my radar. Too bad."

.

"Nobody said it better," Sydney agreed, from the door, gun in hand.

Lyle made a face. "Catherine, leave him alone. Let 'im go."

Sydney smiled.

Broots looked from Lyle to Sydney, then back to Lyle. Why was he calling Sydney 'Catherine'?

"I don't think so," Sydney replied, still with that strange smile that wasn't like his own smile at all.

Broots's eyes widened. Oh! Crap! Catherine was... p-possessing Sydney, or something. Which... totally possible... ap-pparently, because, yes, they were both... both, like, they had the Voices. Crap!

Lyle stood up, staring at Sydney/Catherine seriously. "You, girly, right this instant! Don't make me come over there!"

Sydney laughed.

Broots cringed. Oh, man, that just wasn't nice!

"No, not with the," Lyle imitated Sydney's laugh, "ha-ha-ha laughin', with the leavin' gramps be! This 'as nothin' to do with him. This is between you and me... I... Who cares!"

Sydney's eyes glittered. "And now, back to Hell with you, fiend!"

"Clichéd much? Go on, run that one by me again." He sighed. "Look, Cathy, here's the thing... Well, how about I make you an offer? Yeah?" He smiled. "You, get outta him, an' come join _my team_, instead?" Held out a hand.

Broots reached for the lamp, slowly, backing away, back against the wall.

Sydney narrowed his eyes. "And how do I know you won't doublecross me, Empath?" he spat.

"My word of honour."

"You don't have any honour, Devil spawn!"

"But you, clearly, you are _some kinda_ charmin', darl. Jus' so happens, my love, I kinda like charmin' ladies. Oh, come on, get over 'ere - then we can really talk! Just you an' me, eh? We'll 'ave a heart-to-heart. For real. Yeah? Howzat, Mummy? Good idea, or not so much?"

"Or I kill you where you stand!"

"Oh, but where's the fun in that?" He dropped the smile, suddenly. "Let him go, Caitrin, you're damaging him!"

Sydney dropped the gun to the floor and leapt at him. "I should have ripped you out of me the moment you were conceived!"

"Gory, Mother," Lyle said, easily stepping out of his way. "Let him go and I promise, anything you have to say, I'll listen. We'll _all_ listen."

Sydney smiled. "No, you'll be dead!" he spat.

"Jeez, lady, I hate tah say it, but the guy had to be stoned, blind drunk, stoned _and_ blind drunk, or you way possessed his ass, cos you're not really cute, at this moment, not at all, an' I'm havin' a bitty bit o' trouble seein' what he saw in you, if you catch my drift? Not cute, Momma." He put out his hand. "Be a darl - leave the old guy alone. Talk to me." He wiggled his fingers. "Gimme ya hand... well, gramps' hand. C'mon. We can talk about this; we're both adults."

Broots didn't dare mutter, "Cop out much?" Didn't dare. He kept his eyes fixed on Sydney and Lyle, hoping like crazy he wouldn't have to smack anyone with the lamp he was now clutching. Sydney's nose was bleeding, but there was nothing he could do about that: it was... had to be Catherine. And, unfortunately, he wasn't an exorcist.

"I'll let you play with my buttons, if you like. You can press anything you like. Anything! An' I won't stop ya. Nope. Anythin'!"

Still, he couldn't help but pull a face at that. _Come again? Play with your _buttons_?_ If it hadn't struck him, at that moment, as very bloody kinky, he might have hissed, "You're a human being, you bloody idiot! You don't have buttons!"

Then, to his amazement and horror, Sydney (or rather, Catherine) reached out and took Lyle's hand, and Sydney fell, smack!, onto the floor, out cold.

Cautiously, Broots put the lamp down and crossed to Sydney's side, placing a hand on his chest to make sure he was breathing. He was. He sighed quietly, and glanced at Lyle, who seemed to just be standing there, a blank look on his face.

_Don't you dare press any buttons!_ Broots thought forcefully. _Don't you dare, Catherine Elaine Parker! He's a nightmare enough, as it is!_

He didn't glance that way again until he heard someone crying, and, oh, it was the nightmare. And then he stopped crying and said, "Shhh. I can make you forget, if you want. Is that what you want?" And he nodded, looking miserable again. And, "Okay, baby. Okay. For you, Momma can do that." And then... the sadness just vanished from his eyes, and there was nothing really there.

.

"No, _you_ listen up!" Barb burst into the room, evidently under the belief that what she'd just spat out sounded pretty darn cool, but the colour soon dropped outta her balloon. "Who the fuckin' Hell is that?" she growled, at Broots.

"That... is the result of letting some strange lady press his buttons, if I'm to have understood correctly."

She pulled a face. "Fuck me!"

That didn't seem right, not for her, Broots thought. "Are you alright, Madam Chairman?" he asked.

"Never better!" she snapped. "Get your fuckin' sticky nose outta other people's business, Mr. Broots! And keep it that way, if ya wanna live! Never better!"

"She took a bit of a bump to the head, I'm afraid," the thirty-something African-American woman by her side supplied.

"I see."

"Fuck it! Empaths! Fuckin' slimy freaks!"

"Ma'am?"

"Shut up!"

Thirty-something fell silent, holding back a sigh.

Thinking about it, Broots was actually amazed that Barb had noticed the difference in Lyle, that she'd clued onto that something mightn't be quite right with him, after all.

Barb whirled around, to stare at Thirty-something now. "Are you sure you brought the right one back, woman? _Absolutely sure?_"

"I... I'm not an Empath, ma'am, but I... think so."

Barb scowled, decided that 'I think so' was as good as saying 'I don't bloody know', and stormed out of the room. "I take back what I said earlier - you ain't worth fuckin' shit!"

Thirty-something finally allowed herself to sigh, when Barb had gone, and walked into the room properly, stopping beside Broots and Sydney and getting down to check if Sydney was okay.

Broots tried not to make big eyes or flinch or anything alienating like that, when her eyes went white, but it was a hard ask. He very nearly backed away, new horror leaping to his eyes. Nearly, but not quite. He was glad.

Thirty-something laid her hand on Sydney's forehead, her eyes as white as ever. "That's better now," she said finally.

Sh-she was a Healer! Just a Healer. Broots laughed. Just sort of... did. Couldn't help it. "Never met a Healer before," he rambled. "Fan-flippin'-tastic to meet ya! I'm Broots." He held out his hand.

"They call me Jamboree."

He grinned. "I like it!"

"Thank you," she replied, and shook his hand.

.

It was all a big surprise, really, until they found out that, really, he might well have been dead, for all the good he was now. Remembered exactly _zip_! So they tried not to tell him too much. Always just in case, just in case he remembered. The Chairman, for his part, thought it would be a jolly splendid idea to get it into his head that he was Theodore Parker. So, before they knew it, here he was, getting around thinking he was some bloke named Theodore. And all that before he'd heard two words about what it was he did for the company, or that he had a twin sister who was currently at large, whereabouts jolly unknown. To say that Raines wasn't happy would have been a gross understatement. Sydney, too, wasn't too pleased, but perhaps that had more to do with the fact that he'd, only hours ago, been possessed by some half-crazy, wholly-dead woman he'd once considered a friend.

Fulton was not surprised. For Crazy, crazy shit like that was normal, hence the nickname.

Cherry and Plum didn't know what to say to him, seeing as how - Oh, yeah! - he didn't know them anymore, and Cox was playing Mr. Doctor, as he so loved to do.

Sims was actually concerned: Well, dang me!, he'd never heard of such a thing before. Yeah, with... other people, sometimes a trauma, a hard knock to the head, and they forgot some stuff, but... Nervous eyes, That had never happened to anyone he'd known... until now. Did they think it would last long? It was quite inconvenient, at the current time. He kept on going, prattling along, until Plum shot him a dark look. Not helping, Johnny!

Reston, on the other hand, actually looked relieved, and Marsh had gone off someplace and come back with her frowney face.

Midori, taking a break from her duties in the lobby, was keen to know of Parker's fate. Was she okay? Would she be untouchable, after this? Would she lose her job?

As soon as she'd uttered the words, Cherry was over there in a flash, too freaked out to be around Lyle any longer, asking all sorts of questions of the petite receptionist: Where had she heard that, then? Had she heard of this sort of thing happening before? Were they all, perhaps, in some kind of danger here?

Plum trudged off after Cherry dejectedly. Sims followed the women, and Marsh tagged along, leaving just Sydney, Broots, Cox and Reston to wonder if today was the day Raines finally got fired, turfed the Hell out. He'd started an argument with Courtland and Fulton had gone with. As to why this was, exactly, Broots suggested that Raines might have handed her an ultimatum: Come with, or get out - permanently! Either that, or it was her own morbid facination for all things dead, Reston snickered, and she was hoping Courtland wasted Raines: Victory!

Everybody seemed to have forgotten Lyle wasn't _actually_ functioning on Pause; he was still around, listening to everything they were saying. Then, Cox's gaze strayed to Lyle, and it seemed to damn on him. He immediately sought to change to topic. "How are you feeling?" her asked Sydney, to nobody's surprise (except perhaps Lyle's, who wouldn't have had any idea that Cox was a doctor).

"I feel fine," Sydney returned, in a rather deadpan tone.

"No headache, dizziness, that sort of thing?"

"I feel fine," Sydney repeated, in an irritated grit. Would somebody just... sic this guy onto somebody else, already!

"Broots?"

"I suppose, if he says he's-"

"Goodness me, man - how are _you_ feeling?"

"Fine."

"Yes."

"Exactly," Broots replied.

Reston shrugged and sighed heavily. "I guess, if everyone's fine, I'd better be off, then."

"Off," Broots muttered under his breath. Jeez, he didn't like that guy. If anyone could get under his skin, it was _that_ fella! The guy was so self-impressed - Oh, I'm Mrs. Bama's favourite! Oh, I'm the new Tower doctor! Move over Brown, old boy!

Reston headed off, disappearing around some corridor not too long after.

Conspicuously, Cox didn't ask Lyle how he was feeling, but offered a quick smile and took off, also.

Broots shared an uncomfortable glance with Sydney, who frowned.

"If I may..." Lyle said suddenly, and Broots jumped, waving a hand at him dismissively.

"They do this all the time! It's sort of a tradition, you might say!" Broots laughed, his smile a bit too tight.

"I see."

"Nothing at all to worry about."

"The young lady who was here earlier, she mentioned something about a woman named Miss Parker, who is, I take it, missing. We wouldn't be re-"

"Nope! _Never_ misses a thing!" Broots interrupted cheerfully. "That's right. She's your sister. Actually, you're twins."

Lyle thought about this for a moment, before responding with, "I trust the authorities are currently looking into her whereabouts?"

"Yes! Yes! Of course! Everybody's very concerned!"

Sydney shot Broots a _Would you shut it now?_ look.

"I'm sorry," Lyle began, but Broots waved a hand, again.

"That's fine. This kind of thing happens. It's nobody's fault. You don't have to be sorry. How are you feeling, anyway?"

"I'm fine."

"But a little... awkward, maybe?"

"I suppose I am feeling a touch awkward, yes. But... there's really nothing for me to be worried about, is there? We all know one another; we're all c-c-co-workers?"

"Yes," Broots confirmed. "We do work together. You got it!"

"Mmm." Lyle didn't go on to ask what they did, exactly, or what it was he did, he just stood there looking as though, any moment, someone might leap out from around the corner and accost him, very uncomfortable, in other words.

The shouting went on, but when Miss Parker's name came up, Sydney decided that was their cue to leave. He sighed and clapped his hands together. "Anyone up for a coffee, gents?"

"Sounds great!" Broots chimed, trying not to give Sydney a funny look for the 'gents' thing.

Lyle blinked, shrugging a little. "I... I can't... remember..."

It was on the tip of Broots's tongue to say, "You don't drink coffee", then he thought, _Well, hang on! Maybe, if he remembers that he doesn't like the stuff, he might remember something else, too. Then he'll be able to bugger off and find Parker before she finds herself a whole load of trouble with those nuts from the Tower._ "Aye! Never mind about that, buddy, I've got a passable memory on me. I even know how Syd takes his-"

Sydney gave him a dirty look.

Broots shrugged. "I mean, that's unless he's trying something new this week, right?" He laughed.

With a sudden malicious smile, Sydney muttered, "Duct tape!" and Broots froze in the middle of the corridor, looking highly concerned.

"Are you okay?" Lyle asked, coming up beside him.

"Yes. Yes. Very okay," Broots confirmed, with wide eyes. "I just remembered that I haven't phoned my girlfriend yet. Since we've been back, I mean."

"She'll be worried."

"Yes, yes, that was just what I was thinking. It'll be the first thing I do, after coffee. I don't want to sound too... under the weather, you know. She gets... huffy about that sort of thing."

Lyle nodded and went on walking. When they stopped to wait for the elevator, he asked, "Do you suppose she'll be okay?"

"Hmm?"

"My sister? She'll be okay, won't she?"

"Oh yeah! She's a- she's a fighter!"

Lyle frowned suddenly. "It is your opinion that she's found herself in some sort of trouble?"

"No. No. I..."

"She's gone away for a couple of days to attend a conference," Sydney spoke up, glaring at Broots. "Against the Chairman's wishes. So, you see now, who knows what the guy's going to say when she gets back." _And would you quit twitching!_

"A conference," Lyle echoed.

"Still, naughty her!" Broots butt in, earning himself another glare from Sydney.

"I am sure she had her reasons," Lyle replied.

"No doubt," Broots added, with a nod. "Never does anything without a reason, that one."

Lyle frowned, glancing at him with a troubled expression. "I would appreciate if you didn't refer after my sister as 'that one'," he said. "Does the Chairman know this? About my sister's attending this conference, I should say?"

"He does now," Broots replied. "I guess that's what all that yelling was about, eh. It's always something, isn't it?"

"The authorities get rather worked up about people wasting their time."

"That'll all be sorted out, don't you worry," Broots told him.

"I do hope it will be sooner rather than later. I shouldn't want my sister to find herself in any trouble with the authorities."

"I'm sure it'll be fine," Broots replied, glad when the elevator came, at last, if only for a moment of peace. Jeez, he hadn't figured on how annoying Lyle could be sometimes. The guy was already annoying enough as it was, he hadn't thought he could be any more annoying. But then, Bam!

"Should I try phoning her?" Lyle asked, in the elevator.

"That won't work," Sydney replied shortly.

"Yeah!" Broots backed him up. "She lost her cell a couple of days ago. She must have a new one, by now, but I wouldn't know the number. I don't think she'll have got around to telling you, either. She can be kinda absentminded when her mind's on other stuff; stuff she's really into, you know."

Lyle didn't say anything, but frowned.

.

Jarod glanced around the empty guest room, a frown on his face. "Now where's that obstinate woman got to?"

"Gone, I suppose," Margaret replied, from the doorway. "To pick a fight with Raines, or the Chairman, probably. She's too headstrong; she always wants her way."

"Don't I know it," he replied.

"Unfortunately, your sister's gone with her. And she's taken Hubertus."

"What?" He swung around to meet his mother's eye.

"Apparently so," she replied heavily.

"Why would she do that?" he demanded, sounding hurt and deeply worried.

Margaret shrugged. "She may have the right idea, who knows? Think of it this way, sweetheart: if Hubertus turns out to have inherited the Anomaly from Em, he may one day become a Pretender. Then a lot of people are going to want to get their hands on him."

"So? So what? What's that got to do with Emily going with Parker to the Centre?" he asked, stricken.

"Oh, silly you, she's not taking Emily to the Centre. Didn't Ethan tell you?"

"Tell me what, Mom?"

Margaret sighed heavily and sat down on the newly made bed. "As you know, sweetie, families of employees are granted exemption from... from harm, you might say, so long as the company doesn't take too great of a fancy to them."

"I still don't see where you're going with this!"

"Miss Parker's brother, Crazy, not dead after all. I take it that Em's going to go there and insinuate herself in there some way."

"What?"

"Amnesia."

"Rubbish!"

"Ethan says it's real. Catherine told him herself."

"Among other things," Ethan said, from the door, with an uncomfortable look on his face. "It is real. Mom says it's going to be a new beginning for him. She thinks it's neat. You know, Emily getting her revenge on the freak, once and for all. I... wasn't the one who suggested it. Parker was. Sorry, sister, I mean _Catherine_ did - through Parker. Talk about creepy." He shook his head. "Parker didn't like the idea much, but I told her to go with it, for now. Catherine taking control of her like that really freaked me out. So long as they do what she wants, I figure Parker will be safe until Sydney can train her up to be able to fight just any old someone... you know."

"But Catherine isn't 'just any old someone', Ethan," Jarod pointed out.

He winced a couple of times, irritably. "I know that, but Sydney... He can still try."

"He certainly can, but I'm not sure they'll be making any great headway against Catherine in that state."

"What do you mean?"

Jarod sighed. "She was mentally ill for a long time, Ethan, I thought you'd have known that. Quite mentally ill. Honestly, now would I have been so accepting of Lyle being the way he is had she not been known for her teeny, tiny deranged moments?"

"What?" Ethan frowned.

Margaret shook her head. "Jarod, please, you don't have to be telling him all this."

"She was his mother, he deserves to know. She killed a bunch of guys, once, Ethan. Sweepers. Killed them with the power of her mind. That's all. Lost it and killed them. Don't tell Parker I told you this, but it's the truth. She was powerful, only, she didn't know it. Afterwards, she forgot all about it."

Margaret didn't look at him. In her opinion, all of this was rather distasteful. If it'd been up to her, she'd never have told Ethan any of this. None of it.

"W-why? Why would she do that?" Ethan asked uncertainly.

"She felt threatened, I guess. Or else, she felt like somebody was threatening someone she cared deeply for; Miss Parker, probably."

"So she killed some Sweepers?"

"Unfortunately, yes. The Chairman had her put away, for a while, you know. Put under surveillance, but she never showed any signs of that kind of behaviour again. Raines was all I've-come-to-save-the-day about it, too, mind you. Very much on Catherine's side, that day. I suppose that might have been where she got the idea that he was, at heart, really a trustworthy bloke. A couple of supportive words and Bang!, you've got you a sucker, hook-line-and-sinker gone. A pity really." He sighed. "Ethan, for what it's worth, I think you did the right thing."

Margaret coughed, her eyes wide in incredulousness. "Oh, no doubt about it, sweetheart!"

Ethan glanced at her worryingly.

"Don't worry, sweetie, I'm on your side. I'm just stirring Jarod up a bit."

Jarod rolled his eyes, raising his hands. "Didn't work, Mom."

"Oh, well, sadly."

Once Ethan had left, Margaret grabbed Jarod's arm. "You stay right here, you hear me! You don't go after them!"

He shrugged her concerns away, then said seriously, "If anything happens to Em or Hubertus, _I will waste that creep!_ I don't care if you're in love with him, or what!"

Margaret made a face. "I am not in love with him, Jarod! He's my friend's son, and that is all!"

"He's insane, Mom. Beyond-help insane! You're not insane too, are you? Cos you sure could've foo-"

Margaret slapped him loudly, her eyes dark and angry. Then, without a word, she turned on her heel and left the room.

"You _think_ he's Catherine's son!" Jarod hissed after her, raising a hand to his face where she'd hit him, a look of hurt erupting, abruptly, in his brown eyes.

.

Mr. Broots had been nice enough to drive him home, but still, Lyle didn't know which key it was that opened the front door, so he stood outside for a while, looking at all of his keys, trying to decide which one it might be, then trying out a couple until he found the right one. It was a bit embarrassing, but thankfully, none of the neighbours came out to say anything about it.

It was dark inside, so he left the door open 'til he'd found a light switch and put the hallway light on, then pulled the door closed after him. Turning away from the door, he backed sharply into the hard surface. "Who are you?"

The woman made a face, standing by a door that might have lead to the lounge room or study, then she laughed in an overly dramatic fashion. "I'm the ghost of bloody Christmas past, you idiot! Happy, are you?"

Staying right where he was, he replied, "Are you... my flatmate?" She wasn't wearing a ring, and, for that matter, neither was he, so, he hesitated a guess, she was hardly going to be his wife.

"Yeah..." She grinned suddenly, nodding as she did, something about her tone telling him he'd said the wrong thing.

"I'll be honest with you," he said quickly, "I don't remember. You, this _house_, or... or much of anything, really. I..." he pointed to his head, "got hit, or something, and now I can't, for the life of me, remember! It's very... frustrating."

"Fruitcake!" she muttered.

"Pardon me?"

She stepped closer, making him suddenly all the more uncomfortable. "I'm your wife, idiot! Oh, but why am I not wearing my wedding ring? you ask?" she mocked, in a dopey voice. "Shit, I do wonder why that is - don't you, HONEY? _You cheating bastard!_"

His eyes widened. "I'm sorry. I don't remember."

She laughed. "Oh, isn't that convenient, honey?" she cooed. "A nice little solve-all, you seem to have landed yourself in." She scowled. "You poor fucking bunny! Guess what?" She laughed hysterically. "I _don't_ care!" She pointed to the door sharply.

He shook his head. "Where am I supposed to go?"

"I don't care!" she repeated, with less anger now, but with more of a _I just don't give a fuck_ attitude.

"Sweetheart-"

"Oh shut up, you bastard!"

"I promise I won't, I won't... bother you, in any way. Just let me stay? Just for one night? Hmm?"

She grinned manically.

"Please, sweetheart."

She shook her head. "Fuck you!" she spat, pointing angrily to the door she'd just come out of. "You stay in there! You don't come out! You don't come the fuck near Kyle or I! You do, an' I'll fucking call the cops on your ass so fast, you won't have time to run off to your little mistress and whine about your mean old bitch of a missus!"

He shook his head again. "I won't come near you or... or K-k-kyle."

She laughed suddenly, and turned and stormed off.

"Y-y-you are a big bloody idiot, Theodore!" he muttered to himself, finally stepping away from the door he'd pressed himself back against. "You! I don't understand you at all!"

The woman reappeared in the hallway, startling him, and she laughed again, much as she had before, kind of manically. "Oh, and 'sweetheart', don't expect to be seeing your ring any time soon, or, for that matter, _ever again_! I pawned it! Just thought you oughta know. Night-night, sweet dreams - and all that fucking bullshit!"

"Good... night... to you, too..."

.

He woke, in the middle of the night, to find his wife sitting on the coffee table, glaring at him.

"The only reason I _came back_ was because Mel asked me to!" she hissed. "No, I think 'pleaded with me' would be the more appropriate term!"

Sitting up, he shook his head, frowning a bit. "I don't know who that is, I'm sorry," he told her.

"Your sister, you fucking 'tard!" she growled.

"I'm sorry."

"Fuck you!"

"I've not just been saying it because I like it, you know," he told her. "I honestly can't remember. Do you know what happened to our wedding photos?"

She grinned, a wicked little spark lighting in her green eyes. "Burnt them!" she chimed happily.

He rubbed his cheek with a hand, searching for the right way to put it. "Look, sweetheart, please stop ruining our things now. I... I'm very sorry that I've hurt you, but I honestly can't remember having done so, so... please, stop now."

She started laughing.

"Please."

She suddenly stopped laughing and met his eyes. "Why don't you use my name, 'sweetheart'?" she cooed.

He looked away from her eyes, irritably, and stared at the coffee table, instead, at her leg. She was sort of a small thing, he'd noticed. He'd have liked to have hugged her, to have been able to put his arms around her and apologise properly, but he wasn't so sure that would be in his best interests, at this point in time. "I... I don't remember it, sweetheart. I just... can't bring it to mind." He shook his head. "I couldn't even remember my own name until the Chairman told me, this afternoon. It was most... troubling." He looked up now, meeting her eyes once more. "What... what is your..." He sighed. "Please don't make me say it, sweetheart. I feel like a- a fool."

"Maybe that's because you are," she scowled quietly, and suddenly leant closer to smack her palm against his forehead. "Reality check, idiot!"

He didn't dare reach up to take her hand, though it would have been nice; it would've made him feel better.

She widened her eyes sadistically. "I dare you: _take a lucky guess!_"

He shook his head. "No, sweetheart, I won't play that game with you. Just tell me, go on. Tell me."

She scowled. "Fuck you!"

He surprised himself by reaching over and placing his hand over hers, stopping her from standing and walking off again. "I'd _really_ feel better knowing, sweetheart. Then I wouldn't have to... keep calling you that, sweetheart, r-ridiculous word that you won't even believe means anything anymore because... I was stupid. Stupid. Please tell me."

Glaring at him, she finally gave in and spat, "Lulu, stupid!" And then, without waiting one second, she'd pulled her hand out from underneath his and left again, slamming the door after her.

"Goodnight, Lulu," he said to no-one. "Theodore's really sorry, and that's the truth. Sadly to say, he's a.. he's an idiot, too, and... he's sorry you married such an insensitive person who'd... who'd take your feelings in such disregard, as though they didn't matter at all. I... I'm sorry, and I do think they matter. I... do think you matter. I hope... I hope you can let me show you that one day. I was just a _really big idiot_ and... and I'm hoping you can forgive me, for that. I'm hoping... you're not an idiot like I am." He sighed to himself. "Goodnight, Kyle. I'm sorry I didn't think about you, either. Your dad's an idiot. Trying not to be, now, but still - an idiot. I love you, both..."

.

"I'm sorry, honey," she said, in the morning, perched, once more, on the coffee table. He'd just woke up, just opened his eyes, but she'd obviously been sitting there for a while, because she didn't wait two seconds before going on. "I was just a silly billy! You're not going to... leave me, are you? I thought about it some more, last night, and I've realised that it's probably just as much my fault as it is yours, that you felt the need to seek comfort in some other woman's arms. I can be... mad! I know that. I... That's why I... I need you. Please, please don't leave! I want... I want you to stay! And I'm not just saying that for Kyle's sake." She shook her head. "I'm saying it because... You're my husband and I love you. And I'm so sorry I was such an ass to you last night."

The morning light made her hair very red and the rest of her rather pale and tiny. "Don't be... don't be ridiculous!" he told her, hurrying to sit up. "Of course it's not your fault! Mad or not, sweetheart - it's very obviously my fault! We are still married, and I might have... I might have..."

"Oh, really," Lulu told him. "There's no need to be old-fashioned now. I _understand_!"

He shook his head. "I was the idiot. You... didn't do _anything_ wrong. I'm just... an idiot."

"You're not an idiot," she said, with a bit of a pout.

"No, really, I think I must be! I truly must be!"

She looked at the carpet, at her little, pale bare feet. "I forgive you. Can we... move on, now? Put it behind us?"

"No! No! You-"

"I'm over it. I forgive you," she told him. "You didn't call the cops on me for being such an unbelievable bitch last night-"

"On what grounds? It's your house as much as it is mine, sweetheart."

She huffed. "I know. But I was bratty. It was... immature of me. I could've said the same thing, ten _times_ more eloquently, ten times less aggressively."

"Sometimes, you have to raise your voice and yell a bit to get your point across, honey."

She widened her eyes. Of course she knew _that_. But... she'd done a bit more than shout. "I'm sorry I threatened to throw you out or... or call the cops on you."

"Over it. Really. Already forgiven you."

She smiled a little bit, biting her bottom lip. "Are you having a laugh at me?"

"No. No! I am not having a laugh at you, Lulu."

She thought about this for a moment, her eyes travelling away, to the left, then returned them to his face. "I believe you. For now."

He smiled. "You're so beautiful."

The sparkle in her eyes dulled a little. "You've said that before," she shared. "Used to tell me all the time. Sometimes, I wished you wouldn't. I mean, it's not like you'd ever say, 'You're not looking so great, today', so why... why go on about it? I used to get annoyed about that. It was like you were trying to convince yourself that... I dunno... that I was beautiful, that being beautiful alone was enough to make you want to stay-"

"That's not what I meant!" he cut in genuinely. "Not what I mean," he added. "I... I don't know if you see yourself as... as beautiful, or even if anyone else would think so, too, but I think you are. You're beautiful to me. I feel... happy looking at you, knowing... that I've got you. You make me really happy! I don't know why - I don't remember why, if there even is a why - all I know is - it's... it's real." He placed a hand on his chest. "You make me happy, and I want to make you happy, in return."

She frowned, twisting her foot on the floor. "Have you been drinking?"

"Not at all. No. Nothing. I haven't... had anything alcoholic."

"That's good," she replied. "I don't know if you... know, but you're diabetic. You don't really... drink."

"Thanks for telling me," he told her.

She grimaced. "Just being a good wife, I guess," she said.

"You are. You are a good... person."

"Sweetheart."

"Yeah?"

"You're pretty pretty yourself," she said, and smiled.

.

"What kind of a monster was I?"

"You weren't a monster at all," Margaret reassured her. "You were confused."

Harmony laughed sadly. "I don't... I don't care, Maggie! I don't care what I was - what _she is_! I won't have her terrorising my family this way!"

"I don't see you as having any other choice, Harmony," Margaret shared.

"Oh, there is a choice!" Harmony replied, with feeling.

"And what is that?"

"I can remember. Not just little bits here and there, but _everything_! I can remember, and I can say 'that's it, enough is enough!' I can take back my life!"

Margaret sighed. "If only it were that easy, Harmony."

Harmony stood up, defiance clearly written on her face. "Oh, it _will be_!"

.

"I hear you're up to your usual antics, David," Miss Parker said, when they met in the corridor at work, later that morning. "Stringing everyone along on some devious, despicable plan you have going in that sick, little mind of yours. A favourite pastime of yours, as ever."

He smiled. "I'm sorry I forgot your name, Mel. It won't happen again, I promise."

"Shut the fuck up!" she scowled suddenly, no longer in a laughing mood. "And don't you fucking dare call me that again!"

He frowned, confused. "Call you... M-mel? That's your name."

"And I don't fuckin' advertise it to the whole world, freak!" she spat meanly. "Need to know basis, asshole! If I tell you my name it's because you said 'squeal, bitch, or I'll redecorate that fucking wall with your grey matter'. _Comprendre?_"

"Oh, no! Emily would never have said anything like that - to anyone."

Parker snorted. "Fuck you! And fuck your stupid bitch ho wife!" she snarled, and stormed away.

He frowned worriedly, glancing at the wall beside him. Was his sister angry at him for some reason? Was it, perhaps, the same reason Emily had been angry at him? Had he... given them both a bad name, now? That... that didn't sound good. Not at all.

.

She stormed into Raines's office, kicking the door shut after her angrily, and up to his desk. "You, you sick SOB, what the fuck's that loser playing at? What fuckin' asswipe game have the two of you got going now? Own up, fucker!"

He glanced across at her quite peacefully. "I heard... Catherine might've done it. Mind you, love, don't ask me how, but I'm about willing to believe it, too. That boy's been acting off ever since he got back from Bama."

Parker glared at him with death in her eyes.

"I bet that really put the creepy-crawlies under the poor thing's skin, too, when you turned those mean woman eyes on him. You mustn't be so awful to him, hon; he's going through... something quite unpredictable. You don't want to provoke him. Now, had he been his usual antagonising, cannibalistic self, I might've said, "Go for your life! Give 'im Hell, honey!", but he's not, not his usual self. And I don't trust this one, whoever, whatever he is. So, I want you to be careful. I don't want you getting hurt. And don't make Cat angry, or, you never know, it could be you she's messing around with next."

Parker scoffed. "You have no idea, do you, old man!"

"Absolutely none," he replied easily.

"Imbecile!"

"Why, it's lovely of you to have noticed. Yes, I do get a little ahead of myself sometimes. Hey and, sometimes, I even say some things that I shouldn't, to some people I shouldn't, but, will you look at that, I'm here and you're here and no-one's come to take you away. And why's that, do you think, little lamb? Because I'm a real fuckin' imbecile. You gotcha! Yes I am! But, fuck it, I'm your father, and that's only right! If it's for the kids' sakes, then it's justified, right! Too right, William!"

Parker dropped the mean look, sunk into the chair in front of his desk. "What the fuck, Raines? Are you feelin' yourself? Orra you an' that woman been-"

"Oh, we have not!"

She snorted. "She's exactly your type, and don't think I wouldn't know. Blonde, brown eyes. Loa-ded, and I mean in _that_ way!" She widened her eyes on the word _that_. Uh-huh, uh-huh.

"I don't know which way you mean," he replied merely.

"Yeah, you do!"

"Maybe I do, maybe I don't. All the same, Miss Parker, I don't see that it's any of your business, frankly, who've I've been-"

She grinned. "Boinking!"

"Intimate with, or not."

She snickered. The phone rang. She made a face at it. Interrupterer!

"William Raines here. Oh yes. Hmm." He glanced at Parker. "In fact, I think she'll be heading your way very soon, Dr. Green." He waved a hand at the door, indicating that she should leave.

She poked her tongue out at him and mouthed, _Boinking!_

He shook his head, with a very serious look on his face, and nodded to whatever Sydney had said, on the other end of the line. "Well, I think you'll find I can be rather diploma- Oh, don't _you_ laugh, Green!"

.

"Thank Heavens you're okay!" were the first words out of Broots's mouth, when she stepped into Sydney's office. "You _are_ okay?"

She didn't smile, but shrugged. "Brown figures so." She'd had a medical exam with the Tower doctor this morning. An unenviable experience, for sure. She sighed. "It's just a conference, right? Only Courtland knows the truth? To everybody else, just a conference?"

Broots nodded. "Yeah, you just went to a conference. Barb thought that one up, thought it would be best. The woman's kinda bonkers, if you know what I mean."

Parker laughed. "Oh-ho! I heard that, too. And oh, I _do_! Alex's Mom. Gotta be bonkers. Basically mandatory for the role, right?"

"Wait! She's really his Mom?"

"Yep."

"I thought he was just, you know, kidding."

"Alex, with a sense of humour?" Parker frowned. "You're kidding me, right?"

Broots shrugged.

She nodded. "What's the story with Lyle? Brown was... irritatingly vague. Bump on the head, he says. Everything with him, 's a bump on the head, lov; nothin' to worry yourself ohvah."

"Here comes Barb's favourite bit..."

"Uh-huh," Parker nodded.

"Shot himself. Three times. Feeling a touch _suicidal_," Broots told her, widening his eyes.

Parker didn't even laugh.

"You know, _pay_back."

"Ha-ha," she deadpanned. "Except, it's kinda unbelievable. For me, sure, but Lyle - _non_."

"No it's not!" Broots refuted. "Believable for you, Miss P.!"

"Except, it is!"

"Flaming flamingoes it is!"

"Crashed some car into some tree after _stealing_ said 'some car', Broots. Killed my friend. Suicidal 101! Cos I'm bettin' that's what they told Daddy, ya know. My friend and I had some crazy suicide pact going, or something. Never the truth, with them."

"I've never heard of any of this," Broots replied bluntly. "You're sure this isn't something the Tower put into your head?"

She laughed. "I'd like to see them try, the fuckers! No, this isn't something _they_ put into my head; this is something that really happened. Alex, the dumb fucker, warned them about that place, but they didn't listen, just, ya know: 'Have som'more happy pills, baby!'"

"Alex... warned... _the Tower_?" Broots sounded extremely sceptical of this.

She nodded. "Except, you know what, they couldn't give a fuckin' damn, in fact, they were sooo fuckin' happy. They'd always wanted to train me themselves, but Daddy had always said 'No. No, thank you', and here was their big chance, their big break. So Alex, the sick little freak, could shut the Hell up and fuck off. Like they didn't know he'd killed Alicia!"

Broots frowned, confused now. "The female Pretender?"

"He didn't. That was Kyle's favourite topic whenever he decided it was about time to play Let's-pick-on-Alex. My mother 'rescued' Alicia, but Kendra got blamed for it. Yeah, her mentor. Jacob didn't feel like sticking up for her cos she liked him and he didn't want to give her ideas; she _scared_ him!"

Standing behind his desk, listening to all this, Sydney said nothing, but crossed his arms over his chest unhappily.

"The Tower would've said anything to get on Alex's nerves, and they knew he'd cared about Kyle and Alicia."

"'Had cared' about them?"

"In his saner days, I'm imagining."

Broots shrugged. "So what did they have against him, again? Apart from, you know, the regular? That he was a Pretender and they owned him?"

"He'd been in on Catherine's plan to rescue the kids, apparently. Or so Barb had told them. Paranoid bitch! You know what, he'd probably just been crushing on her. Not that that wouldn't have been enough to piss Barb off, the sick hag! So, they didn't really like Alex anymore."

"Alex was a teenager then, wasn't he? And Mrs. Parker must have visited him, too, like she visited Jarod and Timmy. I don't know what they expected. Alex must have thought himself pretty special, to get a visitor like your Mom. She was kinda pretty, you know. You know! And... she was nice."

Parker shook her head to cut him off. "They _always_ expect _everything_ and yet, they _never_ give anything out themselves!" she told him darkly.

"Did the Tower tell you this, when they kidnapped you?" Sydney asked now.

She turned her attention to him. "No!"

"Then you heard this... from Jarod?"

She decided, then, not to mention Bobby. "My Voices told me, Syd! What did you think, huh? Jarod doesn't give _anyone_ answers - he gives people headaches!"

Broots frowned. "I wouldn't say that everything he's given us has been us-"

Parker silence him with a deadly look. "Believable of Freak how?"

"He _has_ tried the sort before," Broots answered, "You know, when he was..." He glanced at Sydney.

"Six," Sydney supplied.

"He cut his wrists. And then, when he was... seven, he thought he might try his hand at drowning himself - on his school excursion. And I'm sure the list only goes on from there."

Parker snorted.

"It's true," Broots told her.

"So what happened to him? He didn't just whack his head, did he? I mean, first he got shot, a couple of times, I should point out, then he..."

"Died and came back to life - thank you, Jamboree."

"He was _Healed_?" Now _this_ Parker had a _real_ problem with!

'Well, yeah, but I'm guessing Brown only said it as a precaution - he didn't know for sure that Lyle couldn't be Healed. I mean, how would he know unless he'd tried it before, and Blue Cove hasn't had a Healer since the guy from T-Corp who cu-" He fell short. Not a good topic to bring up in front of Sydney, he supposed, seeing as Sydney had been there practically when the guy had cut his heart out.

"That's crap," Parker said. "It doesn't even make sense."

"No, but he's an Empath. It doesn't have to make sense. Perhaps it was one of Jarod's little boobytraps."

"You really think that's Jarod's style? Are you _thick_, Broots?"

Broots shrugged. "I dunno, but Lyle's kinda... nuts. He kills innocent women. Maybe Jarod just had enough?"

"Except, he didn't. He's still living in _la-la_ land, thinking he can save the crazy fuck from himself."

"Maybe Jarod just hadn't thought of it before, or he'd only pulled the resources together to get it up and running?"

"What have you been smoking, Broots?"

He shrugged. "Then what would you suggest happened, Parker?"

"I don't know, but it wasn't Jarod. I don't feel comfortable putting this on him. He'll take offence, and you know it." She glanced at Sydney seriously. "That's not the tripe you've been telling the Chairman, is it?"

"No. We haven't told Courtland anything," Sydney replied. "Barb did all of the talking, and Raines, as you know, took over the losing-my-cool aspect."

"As ever."

Sydney nodded.

"Well, thank fucking goodness for that!" Parker scowled. "Apparently that shit works on Courtland. He let me back in, didn't he? Abducted by aliens an' all. Fuckin' asshole! You know he's just going to defend those bastards - say it must've been some fuckin' side effect of some shitty drug I was given by whoever the Hell ambushed us and took me away with them in their magical fuckin' pumpkin!"

"You're certain it was the Tower?" Sydney asked.

Parker snorted. "No, Syd, _it was Jarod!_ We had a lovely time together in the Bahamas, drinking mojitos and shit! What the fuck do you think? It was the Tooth Fairy!" She laughed. "It was the Tower, Sydney!"

"Do you know why they took you?"

"I don't know. I'm still working on whatever the fuck it is I'm gonna sell that imbecile Courtland! I don't know what they wanted, I don't know, exactly, how I got out - I just know I'm out, I here now. And in a royal big mess!" She laughed. "That's all I know, boys. It's killing me, not knowing, but I wasn't about to stick around and find out."

They didn't press her for more answers, so she took that to mean she could get back to her own shit - the shit she was being paid for - so, with a sharp nod, she pulled the door and walked out, to her own office. She'd already been through all that with Courtland and his merry band of Tower goonies, anyway. She wasn't gonna go through it all again today. She hadn't given those bastards anything, and she wasn't about to spill the beans to Green or Broots, either, in case it turned out to be the biggest mistake of her life. You just never knew who you could say stuff to, and who you couldn't; what shit you could even say out loud, and what shit had to stay _firmly_ locked away inside.

There was something those two weren't telling her, she thought, as she pulled her office door closed after her; something that, no doubt, had something to do with the real cause of Lyle's amnesia, something to do with Catherine.

And, yet, they didn't trust her enough to tell her. Well, if they could play it like that, so could she. No effin' way was she letting on that she suspected otherwise, that she'd had help from a Goddamn Empath in getting outta that creepy-ass joint. No way was she sharing that the Tower had really been after Noah, and the Mysterious Healer. Or that Jarod had come to her rescue, outside the facility (something he had still to offer her an explanation for, she pointed out to herself).

She sat down behind her desk and resigned herself to the fact: she'd just have to go back to pretending to give a damn that Jarod was 'free', to pretending that all she really wanted was to see him back in Centre hands. Suddenly, the idea sickened her more than usual, but she pushed the feeling aside.

Pretenders didn't allow for distractions to cloud their vision; they forged ahead, and they succeeded!

.

Clair was in real pain, real, honest _pain_ - her David couldn't remember her! Assuming the role of Clair had been her only way of feeling anything for her brother other than hate, Miss Parker knew this well. Though Clair was no more real than David was, Clair didn't seem to care that David wasn't really the person she liked to think he was: _her_ brother was funny and silly and she loved him. And, now, Clair missed him, would have marched off to look for him, had she not already known how that would end: she'd only find something who _looked_ like him, David was gone. So Miss Parker remained in her office and refrained from allowing Clair free reign. Clair, airheaded up-stuck Clair wanted to shake her head and stoically refuse to accept the truth, wanted to beg David to come back. Clair was, cleary, an idiot! But, despite her idiocy, Parker worried that the fantasy woman was more real than she'd ever be, that _her_ feelings were more real than anything she'd ever felt. It was a moment of crisis, of confusion - no more, no less - and she _knew_ this, but even so, it still bloody _hurt_!

Clair stood up and looked around her office, hating everything in it, in that moment. What was the point of it all, anyway? She lifted her face to the ceiling and stared at it incomprehensibly, for a couple of heartbeats, then she did something crazy; Clair crazy. She screamed.

.

Coming home from work, Lulu greeted him with a smile and "_Hola_", asking about his day, what he'd spent the day doing- oh, computer stuff, well then, he had permission not to tell her, she didn't know computers that well.

He smiled and hugged her. He didn't tell her he didn't know what _oh-lah_ meant. And when she called their son _poco_ or _poquito_, he didn't tell her then, either. He'd talk to his sister, or one of his co-workers - Mr. Broots had seemed like a decent guy - and he'd, he'd get better. At... _everything_.

He didn't even know how to do his job anymore, it was disgraceful, but he wouldn't ruin this for his family, for Lulu and Kyle, he'd do his very best, try his very best. He would even learn Lulu's language so that, when Kyle was old enough, they could teach him, too.

He was allowing himself no excuses. He wasn't just some kid anymore, he was... he was surely in his mid-forties, maybe even late-forties. He could do better than that.

At leaving time, Mel had even come by to give him her new cell number. He'd been pretty pleased about that. He'd wanted to maybe offer her a hug, welcome her home to Blue Cove, ask how she was, how she'd found the conference, but he'd held back, aware of her earlier outburst, aware that Mr. Broots had been waiting to drop him off home and get home himself. So he'd said thanks and let her go. Still, the gesture had given him some encouragement. He'd realised that he had a lot to be thankful for, but, at the top of that list, was his family. His wife and son, his sister. His family.

He couldn't let them down. Not again.

Lulu said it was okay if he didn't keep the sofa company, tonight, nodded and said, "Bueno." He could imagine that she'd been a happy person once, before he'd got to her and messed her up, she'd probably have been the sort of person who smiled when they met someone new, who hummed along to a song they recognised over the radio. She must have been luminous. He wondered what her parents had thought of him, who'd named their son? If she'd been his sister's friend first, before he'd come along and stolen her for himself? If he was a selfish person, if he started arguments just so he could be the one to sort it all out, in the end, the one to talk the angry, shouting person down, wink and say, "Because I'm just that good!"? He wondered why Lulu had chosen him? And why he'd been so selfish as to say, "Okay. If that's really what you want, love; if it's really me, I'll concede: you win."

Because he didn't love his wife, the same way he didn't love his son, he didn't know them, either of them, and he only loved them because he knew that was what was expected, that was what you did, and he'd been thinking, all along, that maybe he'd been that sort of guy, the sort who did things because that was the way it was done; all this time, he'd been selfishly thinking himself the kind of guy who'd never thought things more complicated than that. It only now struck him that perhaps he'd never been that kind of guy at all. No, he'd been the type who'd say "yes" and "thank you, I am married", then take another woman as a lover merely for her having smiled at him with a warm glow in her eyes. He was very possibly that other sort of person, that horrible sort of person who believed that the world revolved around them, that everyone else was only a pawn in any number of their games; very possibly, he was that kind of guy.

The townhouse wasn't theirs, it was _his_. Lulu didn't live there, she stayed with his permission. The place was supposed to be his home but, to him, it felt more like a giant smack in the face, an affirmation of the fact that, really, he was some other kind of dirtbag. The simple fact was either he'd wanted to get to know Lulu or he hadn't because you didn't marry someone if you weren't intending on getting to know them; a partner wasn't a toy to mould to your personal specifications. The way you got to know someone was by interacting, by give and take; it was the same way you got to know yourself because, alone, you really wouldn't know yourself very well, at all.

That was when he decided that, for the time being, he wouldn't ask too many questions. He didn't feel like knowing how horrible he'd been before. He'd woken up, since then, and he didn't intend on falling back into his old ways. He could see it all, now; everything he'd almost lost, and he wasn't impressed by the thought.

It was past ten when Lulu appeared in the door to the bedroom and came and sat down on the bed beside him. "I thought you might have been sleeping," she said.

"No."

She frowned, leaning closer to touch his cheek with the backs of her fingers. He'd been watching the wall and not looking at her, perhaps she'd been worried about this. "You mustn't stay up into all hours. You won't do yourself any good that way, hmm?"

He glanced at her, with a sudden frown. "Lulu...?"

She bit her lip absently. "Hmm?"

"How old am I?"

She smiled suddenly, her eyes smiling along with her mouth. "Fifty-one."

"How old are you?"

"I'll be forty-two, in December."

"What would you have done, had we not met?"

She frowned, tilting her head. "We did meet, sweetheart."

"You had a job. You were brilliant. You had friends."

She sighed. "Give and take, sweetheart. All of life is give and take. You give, you get back. I wouldn't have given a second thought to you, my dear, if I hadn't thought there was something in there," she placed a hand over his heart, "worth having, worth uncovering. You shouldn't kick someone when they're down, but don't you kick yourself, either. I thought of choosing you, and you thought of choosing me, and now, here we are. I belong to you, you belong to me, and I don't like when you do this to yourself." She took his hands in hers and looked into his eyes, made certain he wasn't about to look away, look past her, to the wall he'd been staring at earlier. "I get to say that. I get to."

He nodded silently, glad for the warmth of her hands holding his.

She smiled playfully. "I did have a job, but it was nothing to write home about. I had friends, too, but you're my best friend - and I wouldn't trade you for anything in this life. I can be brilliant, as any of us can, but I feel better when you're with me; I've never been brighter than when you're by my side. If I'd never met you, I wouldn't be me; I'd be some other 41-year-old, living my life, never knowing just what I was missing though missing it all the same."

"You would smile," he whispered.

"_I do smile._ I _am_ smiling!" She smiled a bit more, to prove her point.

"And who would I be without you?"

"You'd still be you."

"That isn't fair."

"Don't you believe me?" she asked, leaning closer, letting go of his hands. "Don't you trust me?"

"That isn't it," he said, a little uncertain, as though he might have been hurt, slightly.

"No, but I might construe it that way; I might be hurt. Didn't I say: I chose you, just as you chose me. You probably don't remember, but you loved me, once. And I loved you for that. I still do. I don't think I could stop if I tried. No, it would take much more than that, to put me out, to make me walk away; you'd have to come at night, in the dark, trick me out of this life somehow, cos I'm not lettin' go. You are mine and I am yours. In this life, for as long as this life lasts. I'll be with you."

"I am still. You have found me troubled, with such words, but I am still and I have heard your words, I will think of your words, for they are living things, moments that have passed, moments we have lived, and will later give names. I will take your moments, as you share them with me, and I will keep them and listen for their messages, their whispers. What have they said to your heart, to your soul; what will they say to mine? I accept your gifts, and I am still."

"As am I," she said, and smiled. _Nope, you can't unpush these buttons, Catherine. Some things can't be undone, once made, and you sure made this one. Oh, you did, you naughty, wonderful thing!_

She hummed _Blue Bayou_, shuffling closer to Lyle. She curls up by his side, quite happy to leave it at that. If she'd glanced at a clock, she knew the story it would tell: it was nearing eleven, slowly but surely approaching a new day. He rested his head on her shoulder, and that was okay, too. She wasn't mad that he hadn't kissed her, that he sometimes said some really strange stuff that took a while to decipher, it was enough that they were together. A part of him remembered, and she would never stop believing it.

.

"Working late again, Cherice?"

"I could say the same of you, Director," she returned, turning to face him. He was holding out a cup of coffee.

"Thank you." She took a sip.

He sighed, looking away across the room, for a moment. "No, it should be me thanking you, I think. It was good of you to... to accompany me to talk with Allan."

"The guy's certainly not James; this fella's... got a lotta miles to go, still, before the penny really drops. If... it ever does."

"Mmm."

"It wouldn't have been fair, otherwise. Allan and Marcia could've made up anything they liked, if someone else hadn't been there to keep an eye out. If they bring you into disrepute unfairly, sir, they bring us all into disrepute unfairly," she told him.

"Yes, I suppose you're right."

She nodded, turning away to yawn. When she turned back, Raines took the coffee out of her hand and offered her his hand. She frowned, not quite managing to take his meaning, this time.

"Come on."

Still frowning, she found herself putting her hand in his. He led her back out the door, switching the light off, on the way out. They walked to the elevator, which they took down to SL-11, to the Commons. She still hadn't worked out his ultimate aim, but she was too sleepy, now, to care. She merely followed where he led.

Commons was empty, the lights dimmed. Persephone's office was dark. She must have gone home for the night, and no wonder, it was past twelve. The place looked funny, with the low lighting, Fulton thought, but she didn't have time to think about too much before Raines was tugging on her hand, leading her someplace else, across the room, easily navigating any obstacles in their path.

He came to a rather ordinary-looking door and stopped, keying a code into the keypad to unlock the door. He opened the door and led her inside. If she hadn't been quite so tired, she might have thought it sorta odd. The room just looked like any normal hotel room. She let herself be led to the bed, trying not to stumble. She sat down on the edge of the mattress, though she hadn't been asked to.

"You'll be okay here," Raines told her, as she stared at a night-light sitting on the night stand, it was in the shape of a starfish and kinda blurry at the edges.

Staring at the blurry starfish, she lifted her feet up onto the bed and lay down. It was strange, how tired she was suddenly. She didn't remember slipping her shoes off, but she knew she must have. She would have looked to see if they were where she thought they were, by the side of the bed, but she wasn't so sure she wouldn't fall off the bed, so she let it be.

The starfish dissolved into blackness as she finally allowed her eyes to close. The bed was so soft and she was so tired.

Walking to the wardrobe, Raines took out a blanket and walked back to the bed to cover her up. She'd been working for too long, not getting enough sleep inbetween. That might have worked for Cox, but she wasn't Cox, and she wasn't a Healer, either.

"_Sleep well_," he told her in Icelandic.

The room was Persephone's, but she wouldn't mind about Fulton having crashed in it. She might be a little annoyed at his having guessed her keycode, on the other hand, he figured, but she wouldn't be too annoyed. He'd get her something nice and she'd let it go, like she always did. As long as she didn't get it into her head that he'd been using it for certain 'purposes', he'd be right. It wasn't as though he'd brought Fulton here for any such purpose, beside, and Angelo would be able to convince her of that fact, if she needed convincing.

He walked to the door, then turned back. Oh, what would it hurt him to stay? Just to make sure Fulton didn't wake up and freak out, not knowing where she was. And as long as he was getting Persey something, he decided, he'd might as well get Angelo something, too. It had been a while since he'd gotten him anything, in truth, and it wasn't as though he had anyone else to give him things; it wasn't as though he could just pop off to the shop and get himself something. And now, Lyle wouldn't be coming 'round to spend time with him, he'd be sulky.

Raines sighed and went to find a chair to put by the bed. Hopefully Lyle would remember who he was in a couple of days. He probably wouldn't be able to help it, he'd just have to say something utterly stupid to Miss Parker and have her hating him again. He always did. Likely something to do with their connection as twins, he thought, sitting down in the chair he'd moved to sit by the bed. Lyle had to keep the connection going somehow, even if it was by loathing and disgust. Raines had a feeling that, without being able to feel connected to his sister, the kid would lose his last semblance of sanity and really go off the deep end. And nobody wanted to know what that would look like, really. Even those who were convinced he was right off his beam everyday would likely be surprised how loopy he'd go then. If one of them was to die, if would have to be him, before her, because he wouldn't be able to go without her. He wouldn't remember how to relate to the world anymore, he'd forget who he was, without his sister. Raines didn't really believe in that sort of thing, but in the twins' cases, he believed it. They were more than just brother and sister, more than just twins. It was complicated and entirely uncomplicated. It just was what it was. But they certainly weren't just twins, not in the sense that someone who wasn't a twin would think it. They were bound together; light and dark, hard and soft, alive and dead. It didn't matter what they'd been before, because they were this, now, and now was what mattered, now was what they remembered.

He sighed, missing his family. "Life goes on, William," he told himself. James had used to say that, much to his daughter's anguish. Yet, it was true. "Life goes on." Wasn't it always the truth that cut the deepest? Didn't that just figure? It wasn't always a bad thing, though, because pain wasn't only deep, happiness and joy were, too.


	3. Chapter 3

"You called him Kyle?"

"I couldn't think of anything else!" Emily huffed.

"And what about you? Who are you?"

Emily shook her head. "You're going to... Just don't laugh, okay!"

"Hmm?"

"Lulu."

Parker snorted.

"Oh _you_-!"

"My apologies! My apologies, I couldn't help it." Parker sighed. "And how are you both?"

"We're fine."

"That's great."

"Speaking of, now that you're up, what about breakfast, eh?"

Parker huffed. "Alright, Mom! I'll be off to stuff me face, then. Tallyho!"

"Tuh-tah."

Emily put her cell phone away and walked back to the bedroom. Sitting down on the side of the bed, she said, "You know what, we should get a time machine. Love a time machine!"

"How long have we been married?" Lyle asked quietly, turning to face her, and she frowned. Hadn't noticed he was awake.

She sighed. "Oh, I don't know. A while."

"You don't know how long?"

"Three years, sweetheart," she said, finally. "A while, but not that long." _Since I was thirteen, actually, but that's another story entirely._

.

Parker walked into the kitchen, pulling up a chair and sitting down. Silvie, who was at the stove making pancakes, glanced 'round at her. "Good morning, Parker."

"Morning. Where's Debbie?"

"Outside, getting something from the car."

Parker nodded. "You know, I don't think he's got amnesia at all."

"Why do you say that?" Silvie asked.

"He said 'hi' when he saw me in the hall, the other day at work. How would he know who I was, if he didn't remember me?"

"Someone must've shown him a picture of you, I imagine. Ezra, probably."

"I'm not so sure."

Silvie frowned, returning her gaze to the frypan. "He'd have called, if he remembered. Debbie and I. Would've found something to chat with us about."

"Yeah?"

"That boy's a gob from way back, trust me."

Parker sighed. "You're not wrong there."

Debbie appeared in the door. "Heya, y'all!"

"Hey," Parker replied.

Debbie froze, halfway into the room, "Oh my God! I got it!" She ran back out of the room, leaving Parker to frown after her.

Silvie took the cooked pancake out of the frypan and put in some new batter.

"Silvie," Parker spoke up, now, "you're Emily and Lyle's daughter, aren't you? Somehow, you're their daughter."

Silvie smiled and rolled her eyes. "I would think the somehow wouldn't be such a mystery, Parker."

"No, not such a mystery, you're right."

"And yes, I am: their daughter. And an Empath, and a Mediator."

"The best of both worlds, then!" Parker remarked.

"The jury's still out on that, I'm afraid," Silvie replied. "I have a couple of brothers, too."

"Reagan and Hubertus, I know."

"Lyle, too. He's three years younger than me."

"I see. So why haven't I met him, then?"

"He's in jail."

"Oh? For?"

"I'd rather not go over all that again, actually," Silvie replied tiredly. "It is really a big, stupid, big mistake, though. Idiot boy! He's such an idiot! Well, probably not as much of an idiot as Dad, but he's kinda hard to beat for idiocy, you know. Yeah, well, you know."

"Not really," Parker returned. "I know he's completely insane, and sometimes, yeah, his plans don't go the way he'd like, but a fair few of them have."

"Which were?"

"All of those girls he's killed and has never been held accountable for killin', for one."

Silvie sighed. "Yeah, I guess you're right. That's one o' them. A couple o' them, I should say. Crazy, pyscho killer boy."

"You're not in the least worried by it?" Parker asked, trying to hide her disgust. "Your dad's barmy and gets around killin' innocent young women, an' you're okay with that?"

"Whose dad's barmy?" Debbie asked, reappearing in the kitchen door, holding a packet of coffee grounds. "Found it! See, I told you it wouldn't beat me!"

Silvie widened her eyes. "Lucky," she said. "Lucky's mad. Barmy, what 'ave you."

"What's new, puddytat? 'At boy's bin mad for years."

"I know."

Debbie nodded. "You know, it was probably them parents o' his! Gettin'-"

"How's the weather out there?" Silvie cut her off, nodding to the kitchen window.

Debbie's eye went to the window and she nodded, too. "Yeah, it's... nice."

"Our parents?" Parker enquired, glancing at Debbie seriously now.

Debbie went and put the coffee down on the sideboard, then turned back to Parker, putting her hands in her pockets.

"Lyle never knew Mom or Dad, just the creepy Bowmans."

"Mmm," Debbie nodded. "That's who I meant." She widened her eyes. "Cos they were barmy, too, weren't they? I mean, they weren't too good at parenty stuff."

Parker shrugged. "I don't know. We never spoke about it. Not that you can trust a thing Lyle says."

.

Fulton opened her eyes, frowning at the strange wall - it definitely wasn't the wall in her bedroom, in her flat - and at the strange room she'd been sleeping in, and sat up. She noticed someone lying next to her and clapped a hand over her mouth to stop herself from screaming. Of course she knew who it was, and of course, she remembered how she'd gotten here, so there was really no need for a freak-out session. It was just the guy she hated like the Plague; the guy who'd killed his wife, killed her ex-boyfriend's wife, and just so happened also to be her ex-boyfriend's brother (but just quietly). The guy who nobody would've blinked twice at if he'd decided, one day, to up and change his name to Death Warmed Up.

She stared at the wedding ring on his right hand. Frankie - Cox, to those who didn't associate with Lyle - wore a ring just like it on his right hand, too. Except it wasn't likely to be a wedding ring, Fulton thought. At least, she'd always heard that Raines's ring was a wedding ring, so it was likely some bullshit cover-up; likely, it was part of some special club they were both in together: Family Killers Anonymous. Cox'd killed his little sister; Raines'd killed his wife, and his illegitimate kids' mother. They were both really charming guys. She refrained from frowning, wondering why Lyle didn't have a ring like the other two did. He'd done his wife in.

She sighed. No, but that wouldn't really be too advantageous for him, she supposed. He liked to pretend he was some great ladies' man. And he already had those creepy voodoo beads. He didn't need any more creepy bling.

"Wow, so you _actually_ sleep!" she commented to Raines, but got no reply back. "Who'd have seen that one coming? C'mon, zombies don't _sleep_!"

Nothing.

"Wow. Just kinda creepy now. You are asleep, aren't you? Not like you're dead, or anything, and I've been sleeping next to some corpse?"

She stared at him for a moment. Nah, he was still breathing. Unfortunately. "Oh, don't mind me. Any time you feel like it, you're welcome to just _drop off your mortal coil!_" She coughed, on purpose.

Still nothing.

"How much did you drink last night, honey buns? And who in the Hell's room is this? Oh, so it's _your_ bachelor pad, is it? Very nifty. Very nifty, indeed. But, ah, I don't think so, not with what's out there, on the other side of that door." Commons, she remembered now. On the other side of that door was Commons. And a little way down one of those halls, the subjects' quarters. Which, all in all, added up to a bad place for a bachelor pad - especially seeing as two of those 'subjects' were Empaths.

She shuffled closer to Raines. "Rise and shine, hon!" She prodded his arm with a finger. Out like a light! Frowning, she tried to remember if she'd walloped him one or anything, but then he'd have bruises, and he had none. And she couldn't remember having had done. She'd just sat down on the bed, next thing she knew, she'd been off to the Land of Nod.

She shrugged out of her lab coat and examined her arms for needle marks. He hadn't dosed her with anything, had he? Her arms looked fine, from what she could see. Then she remembered the coffee he'd brought down for her? She hadn't been feeling so tired until she'd had a sip of that stuff. Suddenly, she felt sick. What if he had done something to her? Was he really that big of a loser and a creep? And would he fucking dare, seeing as she'd been engaged to his older brother, before he'd decided to go bye-bye, cruel world?

She prodded him in the arm again, not bothering to go easy on him just 'cause he was an oldster. "Hey, freak!"

His eyes snapped open. "Annie?"

"Oh, fuck off! No, it's not your lover boy Cox, or your fuckin' dead kid!" Although, lover boy was technically the wrong thing, Cox was his love child, not his lover boy. Still, not like she could give two hoots. If Cox'd been around to hear her say it, she might have amended; she had more respect for that freak than she'd ever have for Raines. So, okay, the dead kid comment was kinda low, but she was mad at Raines, so she wasn't too fussed about offending someone she'd never even met. "What the fuck did you give me?" she growled.

"Give you?" he asked, frowning at her. He sat up. "No, sorry, I don't give people... that sort of thing. I- Not an Empath, can't give people nightmares."

"Oh ha-ha," she mocked. "In that coffee you brought down to Autopsy last night?"

"I was... dreaming about Annie. Which is... strange. I haven't dreamt about Anora for years. Sugar. I just put sugar in it. Anythin' wrong with that, love? Didn't ruin your complexion, did I? Terribly, terribly sorry."

She slapped him over the face. "Did you fucking play around with me?"

He stared at her, a red mark coming up on his face where she'd slapped him. "No. We're... We never played together as kids. How could we have? There is a slight age difference, as you may have no- And that's not how you mean, is it? No, of course not. You mean... the other 'play around with'. I don't think so, no. Most certainly not. Just, ah, Cat, I'm afraid. And, ah, oh yes, Patience. Good old Patience."

Fulton slapped him again.

"You're right. Quite right, my dear. That was rather cold, rather unfair to all of my other lady friends. Oh, the times we had!"

Fulton raised her hand, threatening to slap him again. "Did you fucking _touch_ me?" she hissed.

"Not inappropriately, no. I did not touch you inappropriately, Gaynor."

She laughed, her brown eyes flashing. "I don't believe you!" she spat.

"Well, believe it, cos you, lady, do not turn me on. Frankly, you rather frighten me, at times. This very moment, for instance."

She moved her hand to touch his face. "You'll be lucky if that doesn't bruise," she told him.

"Why are you touching me, Fulton?"

She gave a choking laugh. "Not to sound like a broken record, but it's like I said - I don't fucking believe you!"

"That doesn't really answer the question, I'm afraid, my dear," he told her steadily, looking back at her without a race of fear.

He wasn't scared of her in the least! she thought angrily. He just liked to fuckin' string her along. She leant closer, abruptly, and pressed her lips to his. She pulled away, a moment later, anger surging through her. Yeah, the bastard was so covering up!

"Please don't do that again," he said in a lifeless tone.

"Oh, you fucking did!" she growled.

"Oh I fucking didn't," he replied calmly. "If I'd wanted you in that way, that isn't the way I would gave gone about it. I have more respect for myself than to stoop to such means, believe you me, my dear."

She scowled. Oh, yeah, like Hell he did! She got in his face, her eyes dark with barely concealed anger. "You think you're going to scare me away like you did Michelle, and all of the rest we've never heard about? You think you're going to destroy me, with your sick little games? Guess what, pal? I'll fuckin' kill you!" She prodded his chest. "I... will... kill... you!"

"Ah, go ahead, love!"

She laughed in his face.

He moved to the side of the bed and opened the top drawer on the night stand, taking out a gun. He turned back and offered it to her, picking up one of her hands and placing it in her palm. He closed his hand over hers, wrapping her fingers around the gun. He met her eyes. "No?"

She ripped her hand out of his, throwing the gun away. She put her hands around his throat. It was pissing her off the way he wouldn't stop bloody staring at her.

"You really do have beautiful eyes," he told her softly.

She laughed sarcastically, tilting her head to the side. "You honestly fuckin' think that's gonna work on me?"

"Persephone's at the door," he whispered, without taking his eyes from hers.

Fulton grinned. _Nice try, fucker, but I don't think so!_

The door pulled open and there was Persephone, listening to someone across the room but turning back to the door, already.

Fulton dropped her hands from Raines's throat and scrambled off the bed, bending down to pick up her shoes.

Persephone coughed, from the doorway. "Uh-hum! Am I interrupting something?" she asked.

"Oh absolutely!" Raines replied.

She smiled and left the door, walking over to pick up Fulton's lab coat. She held it out for her.

Fulton snatched it back.

Persephone laughed and pointed a finger at Raines. "You _wish_!"

"Oh, I do!"

Persephone cracked up, waving a hand at Fulton. She sunk down into the chair Raines had moved to sit by the bed the night before, clutching her stomach.

Fulton felt like walking up to her and slapping her one, too, but she swallowed that urge and stormed to the door. They were fucking laughing at her, the assholes! That was the last time she defended Merchant when someone accused her of being a creep behind her back!

She slammed the door after her.

"What was that about?" Persephone asked.

"The poor thing's got a lot of issues," Raines replied.

.

"Fulton!" He ran to catch her up, walking backwards, for a moment, and reached out a hand to touch her shoulder.

She slapped his hand away quickly.

"I'm sorry, hon. Really, I am."

"Go to Hell!" she spat, and pushed him away, stalking past him. She skipped the elevator and headed for the stairs, instead. Fuck him!

He laughed and shook his head. Well, if that was how she wanted it... He leant his head against the door, with a sigh. Oh, goodness, how he missed Edie! He laughed again but it wasn't at all an amused laugh.

.

Emily walked into the kitchen, frowning across the room to where Lyle was sitting in the corner, on the floor, staring blankly ahead of him. "What are you doing over there, baby?" she asked, walking over and kneeling down in front of him.

"So alone."

She touched his cheek. "What?"

"My baby girl."

She frowned. "Who?" she asked quietly.

He blinked, finally meeting her eye. He frowned. "Hello, Lulu."

"Hello, Theodore."

"Are you alright?"

"Fine. You?"

She smiled. "Fine. What are you doing down here?"

"I don't know." He touched her face.

She laughed.

The white in his right eye started to stain red.

She stopped laughing.

He stood up, and she got up too. She took his hand in hers and held onto it.

"Lulu?"

"Yeah, babe?"

"Why did you say 'Who' before?"

She shook her head, forcing a smile onto her face. "I was just being silly, baby. It was just a game." She laughed.

"What sort of game?" he asked quietly, his tone serious.

She touched his arm and laughed. "The silly sort!"

"Are you scared of me?"

The smile died on her lips, laughter was met with ringing silence. "What do you mean, sweetheart?"

"Do I frighten you? Do you worry that I might hurt you, or Kyle?"

"No," she answered plainly. She let go of his hand.

He stared back at her for a long time, watching her silently, waiting for something to change, anything to change, something to tell him something. "I think I do," he said quietly.

"No. No, you don't. Theodore, I'm not afraid of you."

"I'm a bad person."

"No." She shook her head, her expression serious and sad.

"Yes. I hurt you. I made you frightened of me, and then I couldn't stand to look at you and see the fear in your eyes, to look at you and see what I'd done, my own handiwork. So I looked around for someone else to look at me with loving eyes, someone I wouldn't have a chance of hurting, someone I'd never hurt because I had you waiting for me at home, I had you, to hurt, when I felt like it." He brushed a tear from his cheek with a shaking hand. "_I am a bad person._"

Emily shook her head silently. "You love me, Theodore."

"No, I love myself. And even that is a lie. I wouldn't know how to love myself, let alone anyone else. I don't _know_ anything. I _think_ I do, but it's a lie! But you - you were different, you know how to love, and I was jealous, you made me so mad! So I hurt you, I punished you, because you had something I could never have, because it wasn't _fair_! I hurt you and I didn't care - I didn't care how much you cried, how much I hurt you because _you_ loved _me_! I got pleasure out of hurting you, out of turning your own love against you!"

"No," she breathed.

"_Yes._ Yes, yes, yes! And there's more!"

She threw her arms around him, holding him tightly, trembling against him. "Stop!"

"This! This is only part of the game!" He laughed darkly.

"Stop, Theodore! Just stop! Please, baby, stop! You're hurting me now! I'm hurting!"

"I think I should leave."

Tears sprung to her eyes, though she didn't want them. "Noooo! I love you! I love you! We can work this out, baby!" She didn't let him go, though he hadn't made a single move to hug her back, to hold her, too. "You're not yourself. You're going through something. But we can go through it together. Please don't leave me, baby! Please don't leave us!"

"I think I should," he replied blandly.

She couldn't help sobbing. God, she hated all of the lies! If only he remembered, he'd know that what he was feeling was to do with his Empathy, wasn't true at all. "Please, baby, please!" She stepped back from him, shaking legs, shaking arms, and looked up, into his eyes. "What does your heart say?"

"It says I should do the right thing. It says I shouldn't be selfish, I should let you go. It says I wouldn't only be a bad person, if I left, if I left, before I destroy you completely. Before I destroy our child. I have done enough, my time is over. It's your time now, Lu." He stepped back, out of her reach. "I let you go free."

"I won't leave," she whispered shakily, tears blurring her vision. She blinked them away and they rushed down her cheeks.

"Then I shall have to," he said.

She reached for his arm, but he stepped further back.

"Let me do the right thing, Lulu. For once in my life, let me do the right thing."

"I love you!"

"I know," he replied blankly.

"I _am_ sorry. I am sorry I allowed myself to do this to you. I was horribly selfish. I was _wrong_." He shook his head, eyes shining. "I don't want to wake up one day and... and hate you. I don't want to hurt you again, Lulu."

She shook her head. "You won't! You won't, Theodore! I know you won't! You know, now, you were silly, like a child, but you're not like that, anymore."

"I have to go, Lulu. I won't give him the chance to hurt you or Kyle again."

"You won't!" she cried.

"Until I do."

"You won't."

"No, I won't, because I won't be around," he replied. "I am so sorry, Lulu." He walked to the door.

She ran after him. "I'll- I'll stop you! If you hurt me, I'll tell you it's not right - and I'll stop you!"

He looked at her sadly. "No. You won't, Lulu. That's not you. You're not a hurter. You just love."

She stepped in his way, blocking his path to the front door. "I won't let you go!"

He only looked at her, looked into her eyes, into her heart. _Come now, Lu, you know this is the only way._

She shook her head.

"We can't hurt Kyle," he implored her. "We can't let our own affairs, our own personal struggles, take presidence over his happiness. We brought him into this world with the promise of love, with the promise of warmth, of life. Please, Lu, understand this is the best I can do, the best I can be; I can't be the father he needs, I can't even be the husband you deserve, and I'm so, so sorry. I was an idiot before. I was _such_ an idiot!"

"You're my idiot."

"No, Lu, that's exactly what I'm talking about - you'd put up with anything if it meant I came home at the end of the day! And it's got to stop!"

In desperation, Emily put her hands over her ears and screamed. She just didn't know what else to do. Tears poured out of her eyes.

"Lulu, you can do this! _You're strong!_"

"You never hurt me!" she pleaded.

"We both know that isn't true, Lu."

She gulped in a breath of air. "St-stay for lunch, b-b-baby!"

"I'm sorry."

"YOU'RE HURTING ME!" she screamed. "I don't care if you're hurting, too - you can bloody well _put up_!"

"Okay. Okay, Lulu. I'll stay. I'll stay for lunch. But only for lunch."

She slid down the wall, gasping for air.

"Lulu, I know this is hard on you... Lulu, what's wrong?" He got down on the floor, in front of her. "Lulu, tell me what's wrong so I can help you, baby. Lulu!" He pulled her into his arms and held her. "It's gonna be okay, Lu. It'll be okay. It'll be okay." She made no reply, but kept on gasping. The sound was killing him. Was it a panic attack? He didn't know. It killed him all the more. He stroked her back. "Shhh. Shhh." Why the Hell didn't he know what was wrong with her? He was her Goddamned husband! "Shhh. I'm here, Lu. I'm here. I'm sorry. I'm bloody sorry. I'm a fucking idiot. I'm here, baby. And I-I'll stay, as long as you need me. I'll stay. It's okay, baby. Nobody's leaving. I love you."

.

Silvie smiled, walking around the kitchen table. "We made pancakes for breakfast, at Parker's," she told Broots. "We made a few too many, so Parker suggested I take them home. They're in the fridge, if you'd like any."

On the sideboard, the radio announcer told them the weather forecast for the next four days.

Silvie put an arm around Broots and hugged him. "Did they have what you were looking for?" He'd been out shopping, that morning, and he'd just got back.

"No. I'll have a look online later."

"Mmm."

He glanced away from her, to the fridge. He couldn't remember, now, why he'd suggested they live together. She'd had a perfectly good apartment. Sure, he believed a kid should have a stable home life, should ideally have two parents, but, lately, he'd started to wonder why he'd even got together with Silvie. The first time he'd met her he'd thought she was bad news, and, to be honest, his opinion of her hadn't changed much over the years. She wasn't bad looking, but he just couldn't make himself like her.

He'd be letting her down, he knew, when she realised this. He'd tried getting up the courage to tell her, but, since their catastrophic first date, he'd been reluctant voicing his true feelings for her. He just didn't feel comfortable telling her what he really thought when he knew how hard she'd take it, when he didn't mean for her to take it so hard, when he knew that was just that sort of person. It wasn't her fault, it wasn't his fault; it wasn't anyone's fault, really.

And now, with the baby coming, he felt trapped. Now, as he stared into the fridge, at the shabby pancakes Silvie had made earlier, he couldn't help thinking of Jamboree, of the way she'd smiled at him, the way she'd made his heart skip a little bit. Silvie had never made his heart skip.

He closed the fridge door without having taken anything out. Maybe the only reason he'd gone for her after that disaster was because he'd been desperate, desperate for just a few minutes of physical intimacy. And then he had to be landed with some kid, just because Silvie was crazy, because she believed they were meant to be together, because she hadn't been taking contraceptives, and she hadn't bothered to tell him this so he could insist they use protection. She was a menace, in reality. But of course, if he told her that, she'd burst out crying. Then she'd go running to Debbie, or her dad, or Cox. And he'd be the bad guy.

He hated being the bad guy.

She walked over and slid a hand over his back. "What's wrong, darlin'?" she asked, her breath hot in his ear.

He wanted to bat her away, wanted to tell her to give it a rest with that yucky term of endearment, with her dumb Canadian accent. But, instead, he turned toward her and leaned in to kiss her. Yeah, she was a Goddamned witch alright! All she'd have to do was touch him and he couldn't say 'no'. It made his blood boil with anger, but it was also partly his own fault. He was a wuss.

Later, as she grasped the edge of the kitchen table with desperate, sweaty hands whilst he drove into her, his hot cheek pressed to her dark hair, with the sounds of gasping lodged firmly in the back of his mind, he wondered if he'd have the courage to tell her the truth, that he really couldn't fucking stomach her, that he hated her so much, or if he'd have to end up calling Immigration on her, once the baby had come, if he'd have to shoot her, stab her, poison her somehow, if it came to that.

Then, like lightning, or wire snapping under too much tension, he couldn't take it anymore, all of the pathetic, little sounds she made, and he clamped a hand over her mouth. He didn't even care that she was asthmatic. It wasn't like her fuckin' fucked-up freak of a dad would know, now that he was fucked in the head. She couldn't even run off to him and have a whine. And if she fuckin' told Debbie she'd be a bad fuckin' friend, and if she told Cox he'd tell Debbie anyway, and she'd be a bad friend again. She'd never tell.

She didn't try to take his hand away or make a fuss, but then that pissed him off too. He pulled out of her and spun her around to face him, laying a loud smack over her face. She sucked in a sharp breath but she didn't cry. He hit her again, and again. He didn't realise he'd grabbed the sugar jar off the table and hit her with that until he saw her lying on the floor, and the sugar scattered over her and around her, on the floor.

Oh fuck!

.

"My baby! Please, please don't hurt her again..."

"What's the fuckin' kid goin' on about?" the Sweeper demanded, staring at Phelps at though he may have the answer. "This fuckin' kid's given us a holy Hell-load of trouble that I'd really rather not give him the chance to inflict on anyone else. Sir, let me go in there and deal with him! I'll sort him out!"

"No," Phelps told him. "I'll go in and talk to him."

"Sir, you can't go in there alone! He's fuckin' dangerous!"

"Shut up and do your job, Sweeper!" Phelps snapped angrily. "I'll go in there and you won't do a bleeding thing to stop me! You hear me?"

"Sir!"

"That's right!" Phelps snarled. "Give me that!" he ordered another Sweeper.

The man handed over his Taser.

"This kid thinks he can toy with us," Phelps growled. "Well, we'll see about that!" He walked to the cell door and waited to be let in by one of the Sweepers.

"'Talk'," the Sweeper by the observation window intoned, once Phelps had gone into the room and was out of earshot. Sure, he really intended to do a whole lot of talkin' with that Taser.

"The kid doesn't say nothin', _for days_, then he pulls this shit!" the Sweeper who'd handed Phelps the Taser muttered. "The kid's fuckin' insane!"

"He's one of the Improved, George. That's not the same as insa-"

"Shut the fuck up, Karey!" George scowled. "You fuckin' hate him, too! He's a fuckin' freak!"

Karey swallowed any rebuke that he might have been planning. Apparently George was an even bigger asshole than he'd thought, and he was too, for looking the other way, but that was just what he did. The kid had given them Hell. He had.

.

Infinity sighed, leaning back in her metal chair, taking a break from the SIM she and Kim were working on and reaching for her bottle of water. She wasn't some little kid anymore, she was a proper teen, and it had her thinking, thinking about things. "_Hey, Kim_," she said quietly in Greek.

"_Yeah, sis?_"

She'd started to get annoyed with this habit of his, calling her 'sister' all the time. They weren't golly related and it made her so... golly frustrated.

"_Do you think they might try to get me a bun in the oven?_" she asked, making a popping sound with a thumb in her mouth.

"_Clucky, are we?_"

She mock laughed, her concession to sarcasm.

"_Nah, you're a kid, sis. Don't sweat it, 'kay._"

She sighed. "Hmm." _Not as much a kid as you think, bro._

.

Broots put a hand to his head, cursing himself silently for his stupidity. He'd taken a chair at the table to wait for Silvie to come around, but it was taking a bloody while. He'd checked her breathing and her pulse, earlier, and they'd seemed fine, from what he could tell, so he was just waiting, now. He'd take her to bed, when she woke up.

.

Fulton walked over and switched off the radio. Lifting his head from his arms, Raines reached over and switched it back on. Adele's _Lovesong_ was playing. Fulton made to switch it off again, but he kept his hand over the dial so she wouldn't have the chance. The song changed to something Fulton didn't know.

She sat down in the chair in front of Raines's desk.

"Do you know how to knock?" Raines asked, sitting up properly to meet her eyes.

"Never heard of it before," she replied. She stood up suddenly, walked around the desk.

He made a face. "What do you want, Fulton?"

She leaned down and grabbed his arm. "Get up!"

"Why?"

"Just get up!"

He sighed and stood up. He shook his head. "What now?"

She leaned over and turned the volume up on the radio. She met his eye. "Teach me how to dance."

"What?"

"I don't know how to dance. _Ha-ha!_ Teach me."

He frowned.

She stepped closer sharply, grabbing his hand. "Teach me!"

"Alright. Alright, I'll do it, if you learn to knock, the next time you feeling like barging into my office unannounced."

She rolled her eyes. "I'll think about it. If I get the time."

He laughed. "You're sure an amusing woman, love. You're sure amusing."

"Ha-ha!" she intoned darkly.

"Okay, get over here, and don't smack my hand away when I touch you."

"Dirty old man!"

He smiled. "You wish!"

She choked, but couldn't hide a grin. "You really do have a death wish!"

"Are you going to tell me to see someone about it? Sydney, perhaps?"

"Wouldn't dream of it," she muttered, scooting a tad closer. She was sure she must have suffered some kind of psychotic break, just to come in here and ask what she had, but it was the weekend and the boredom was killing her right now. She didn't feel like hanging out with corpses today. But zombies were fine, thank you.

.

"You like to wind a girl up, mister," Emily said, from one side of the table.

"You like to worry a guy senseless, madam," Lyle replied, from the other side of the table.

She smiled. "I got my tricks, honey."

"Tell me about it."

She frowned. "I'm asthmatic. It's not that big a deal. Loads of people are asthmatic."

"Lots of people and my girl."

"I thought I wasn't your girl."

"You'll always be my girl."

"I thought you were leaving."

"I might later."

"Don't you dare!"

"No?" He stood up.

"No!"

He smiled, walking to the end of the table. "You're going to stop me?"

"I'm definitely gonna stop you!" She stood up.

"Show me."

She crossed her arms over her chest. "I will!"

"And I'm saying 'do it': show me."

She stalked over and grabbed the front of his clothes, pulling him towards her and kissing him.

.

Later, they went shopping, but he couldn't think, could hardly think about memorising any of the streets they'd travelled down to get to the shops, his head hurt too much. It hurt like he'd really whacked it, but he hadn't.

"Left," Emily told him. "Mmm-mmm, that one! Good job!"

He shook his head, then regretted it. "They have a sale on," he said, recalling that she'd said something about a sale. "On a Saturday?"

"Yeah."

"But on a Saturday?"

"Yeah."

"You don't find that strange?"

"No, sweetheart, I don't."

He frowned. "I do," he said quietly.

"Don't park under a tree," Emily told him. "Too windy. Can we go by the library, too?"

"Have you got a membership?"

"No. You have."

"Okay. Okay, we'll go by."

"They have a branch in the complex," she told him. "A tiny little one."

"Yeah."

"Grumpy!"

"My head hurts. I have no idea why, but it does. It's not helping my mood."

"I can tell. Have you had enough to drink?"

"Yeah."

She hummed the start of _Blue Bayou_, thinking about what to do about a headache. Willow bark tea would probably help, but she had no idea where to go about getting that. "What kind of headache?"

"The kind that hurts."

"I am a qualified hug therapist."

"You talk to rugs about their problems?"

"Oh you! Hug! Hug therapist!"

"That doesn't make sense."

"I help people by hugging them."

"Next you'll be telling me you're a qualified kissogram, too."

She laughed.

In the shopping complex parking lot, she walked around the car to give him a hug.

"Kyle's wondering where you've gotten off to," he told her.

"Oh you."

"It's true."

She nodded, opening the car door. "Oh, it is so!"

"I didn't say anything."

"But you were thinking it!"

"What was I thinking?"

"'It's not windy', silly socks!"

"Hug therapist, kissogram _and_ mind-reader - my, I really know how to pick 'em, don't I?"

She snorted. "Are you forgetting, I picked _you_, not the other way around."

"I saw you first!"

"Did not!" she replied, taking Hubertus out of his baby capsule.

"Yep!"

"What were you most impressed by? What caught your eye?"

He shut the door for her. "It had to be your glowing complexion, I'm sure," he told her.

"I'm sure!" she replied. "It had nothing at all to do with my kickin' ass."

"Nothing at all," he said, with a straight face.

She laughed and pointed. "Uh-hah! I so just saw you checkin' out my ass."

"I can see your... hem thing," he said, indicating her skirt.

She looked down, her eyes widening. "Argh! Argh, can I borrow your jacket?"

He went to the boot to look if he'd left something in there, came back with a jacket and passed it to her. "It's really not that bad."

She handed Hubertus to him to hold whilst she pulled on the jacket. She nodded. "Trust me, it's _bad_!"

He looked at Hubertus. "What do you think, _poquito_? _Malo?_" He sighed. "Yeah. Daddy's an idiot. Ignore him." He smiled at Emily. "I still think you're gorgeous."

She rolled her eyes, taking Hubertus back.

"Kyle, your mom's gorgeous."

"Kyle, your dad's daft," Emily said to her small son, walking off towards the complex entrance.

Lyle walked after her. "Nice tush, stranger," he told her.

She laughed and spun about. "Pervert!"

He smiled.

"Daft, bilingual _and_ a pervert - my, I really know how to pick 'em, don't I?" She sighed. "Baby, we gotta get you a pram, hmm? Just remind Mama, if she forgets."

.

Shannen sat in her hotel room, staring out the window at her own ghost-like reflection (at the window, not quite out), a script she was supposed to be learning her lines from in hand, her thoughts at a standstill, just staring at that reflection. _I should call Ursula_, she thought. _I should call her. I haven't called her in forever. It'll be Vinni's birthday soon, and I'll have to send a card, maybe even stop by and say 'hello', 'how are you all?'. I should call._ But it wasn't her friend that she wanted to see just then, it was someone else. Except, he hadn't rung her in a while, and as loathe as she was to admit, this scared her. Why hadn't he rung, or come to see her? Was he okay? Were _they_ okay? Or had he dropped her without even bothering to let her know?

Staring at herself in the glass, she wondered if the other her knew how much it hurt to be her right now, if she knew how desperately she wished she _could_ be someone else, not just someone who _pretended_ to be someone else.


	4. Chapter 4

The High Chairman had finally got things into motion, talks with the Swedish, and why not, she was their boss, too, after all - she was all their bosses - and was surprised to learn that they'd never heard of the kid, under the name Rehema, or otherwise, and, when she told them the rough details, they actually looked interested: Really? Was that so?

She didn't give them any more.

.

She couldn't sleep, that night, and though it wasn't by far an uncommon occurrence for her, she did finally fall asleep, at four in the morning (when Jarod might have rung, but didn't) and dreamed of something that was, for her, certainly uncommon, of Raines's aliens or Kyle's angel, or just... something. Something that glowed, something that felt, to her, warm and safe, just like the warmth she'd felt right under her skin, when Catherine had let go of her, not out of shame - people always said, you don't shake a child - but out of alarm, as though she'd been issued a warning: Let go, or I get angry. A wholly strange dream, Parker thought, the next morning, as she tried to figure out the right words to approach Sydney, to ask for his help with the problem she'd been having, the _Momma_ problem.

She couldn't very well go up and say, "She freaks me out, you know - help! Please help! Before she really does something... bad. Help me save her from herself, just this once, the way you couldn't save her before (when she was alive, and breathing, and real)."

.

"There are no photographs of us together, as children," Lyle said, when she dropped by Tech Space to ask after their progress on tracking the Pretender. "It's just you, and you've always this look, as though you're missing out on something. It's very sad. Was I awful to you? Did I bully you?"

Parker made a face. "No, idiot," she told him, "you'd been turfed out with the trash and we'd all forgotten about you." She didn't regret saying it, not until she noticed Sydney standing behind her with a look on his face that clearly said he'd heard everything she'd just said.

Rolling her eyes, she added, "We all thought you'd died. At least, Mom did. And I didn't even know about you, thank you. Nobody thought to tell me - in case I got sad and thought I was missing out on something. Like a brother, or a friend, or someone to actually talk to who wouldn't just look at me, assume they knew everything there was to know about me, and look right through me. I didn't even know I had a brother until _well_ into my thirties."

He frowned. "I suppose neither of us knew about the other. Was I living with another family, as a child, or in an institution? Do I have other siblings?"

She snorted. "No, of course _you_ knew! You're a whizbang Empath!" It only took one look at the look on non-comprehension on his face to know that she'd said the wrong thing - _again!_ - that they hadn't let him in on this little fact yet, and that she was in a teeny bit of trouble for telling him.

"I see," he merely replied. "I think. No, I don't. Theodore, stop it! If you don't understand, have the decency to admit it. Don't just pretend like you do because you want to impress everyone, or... so as not to hassle them. You're being silly."

"You're talking to yourself," Parker added, with emphasis.

"Do I not... do that, usually?"

She shook her head slowly. "Uh-ah. It makes you look _crazy_!" She said 'crazy' very slowly, just to get her point across. "You don't like looking crazy."

"No. I shouldn't imagine anyone would like it, either. Looking, or being..." he looked around the room, as though for the right word, then settled on the word she'd used, "crazy."

"You used to like it well enough," she admitted, and wanted to kick herself for the third time in as many minutes.

"I had, myself, suspected something of the sort," he replied, "though Lulu is too kind. She'd never say so."

"Well, thank you, Kind Lulu. Isn't she just a darl?"

"As you say, she is that."

"Mmm."

"We share the same last name."

"You fell out with your folks and decided to change your name to what it would have been originally, had we not thought you dead, decomposing under the ground," she said.

"We fell out?"

"_Big time!_" she replied, miming talking marks.

"I didn't tease you, then?"

She narrowed her eyes suddenly. "Yes, you did, you bastard! You - are a sick puppy! Sick! Puppy!"

He didn't say anything to that, but seemed to be waiting for her to go on.

She rolled her eyes, huffing. "What? What do you want now?"

"Did I hurt you? Or Lulu? Or someone else, perhaps?"

"Yes, yes, yes. Yes to all of the above. You were always... hurting people. It was your Number One All-time Favourite Pastime." She widened her eyes, pretending as though something had just struck her, something of crucial importance. "I'm sorry, did you want me to lie and say, 'No, no, you were a really nice guy?'"

"No."

She didn't mean to scowl, that was just the way her voice came out: "Good!"

"Miss Parker?"

That was Sydney. She waved a hand at him. "Choo! Can't you see I'm having a bonding moment with my mad, homicidal, cannibalistic twin?" She winced. "Yeah, maybe that was taking it a bit far," she admitted slightly.

"You think so!"

"Yeah..."

.

"I like to make things up, you know - to get on your nerves!" she attempted to cover, though she didn't kid herself for a second that he believed it. It was a combination of the crinkly eyes and the way she leaned closer with half of a painful grimace on her lips whilst her voice pretended to be cheerful and abashed. Not a winning combination.

"There is a reason we've kept you around, however. You're good at finding things that have gone missing. Children, specifically."

"The ones _I_ kidnapped, in the first instance, you mean?" he returned darkly.

"No. You don't eat children, you're not into children."

"Oh, so it's like that, is it?"

"Like what?"

"Sexual in nature."

"Yeah... we don't talk about that, or you'd be... locked up somewhere, I imagine. They've never had sufficient proof to say you did it, but we know it was you."

"You might've put a bullet in me."

"Then I'd be the one in trouble with the law. Hmm?"

"But I kill people - and _eat them_?"

She took a photograph out of her jacket pocket and handed it to him. "Find me this little guy and I'll do you a favour, okay, bro. I'll stick around for moral support when you gank yourself." Sydney grabbed her arm, but she pulled it back, out of his grasp, and ignored him.

Lyle glanced at the picture she'd handed him. "He looks very much like you did, at that age."

"Yes, _I know_. That's why I want you to find him. Though, a word of advice, he's not pee-wee anymore, so you'll be looking for someone about our own age."

"He's gone."

"What?"

"He's gone."

She shook her head. "What do you mean 'gone'? Gone where?"

"Into hiding, remission, subdivision. I don't know. Gone. He's just gone."

"Is this your Empathy telling you this, or are you just pissed at me for spoiling your little game?"

"My little game?"

"The I-can't-remember-shit game."

"It's not a game. Still, the answer remains the same."

"Who is he hiding from?"

"I don't know. People's expectations, people, everyone, anyone. Himself. You."

"I don't know him."

"He knew you."

"Did he?"

"Sometimes, he even dreamt your dreams."

She made a face. "Zip it, creep!"

He glanced at Sydney. "He knows."

Parker whipped around, suddenly. "Knows what? What do you know, Sydney?"

"Nothing," Sydney replied. "Apart from that your brother is, yet again, stringing you along, Miss Parker."

"No, you know."

He leaned closer so that he could whisper to her. "That it is said that he was your real twin? Yes, I know this. I also know that he died."

"He's not dead," she hissed back. "Tower Twenty-nine are looking for him. They want him back. They think he's still alive. And they would know! They have Oracles!"

Sydney laughed. "I don't believe in such things," he said, without bothering to whisper this time, and promptly turned about and walked out.

"He knows," Parker muttered, watching him disappear out the door and down the corridor. "He knows something alright." She turned back to Lyle. "What did you do to your eye, maniac?"

"I did nothing to my eye."

"Yes, you did. It looks disgusting. I've been fighting off saying something, but it kinda makes me want to scream and run the other way, or be sick - on you."

He frowned.

She pointed suddenly. "Uh! Negative feedback! What _have_ you been up to, you naughty, naughty Empath?"

"I'm sorry, but what?"

"Neg-a-tive feed-back. Ya put your little Empath feelers out there, looking for something, and ya found it, but that wasn't necessarily a good thing, cos some stuff's meant to be left alone, or... you know, read page by page, chapter by chapter, not all at once. Don't get greedy, or impatient, it'll come back to bite you in the ass in a bad way. Empathy 101. Know your limits, stick to 'em."

"I think he must have loved you very much."

"You always pretended you did," she replied.

"And I'm a liar, and a sexual deviant, and a cannibal - so feel free to just throw me off a cliff, or something."

"Yes please! I must get me a cliff, one o' these days!"

"There's one outside, not too far from here."

She smiled, shimmery-eyed. "I know!" She leant closer, abruptly. "Find my brother first; _then_ you get your reward."

"He doesn't want to be found."

"Tough! I'm his _sister_! I'm putting my foot down!"

"I may be able to help," Lyle conceded.

"No! Really? How?"

"If you still share your dreams, that could be a starting point."

"Nnn. You're starting to remember how it works, are you?"

"This isn't something that requires memory, I feel."

"Oh, good. Good!" She fanned her face with a hand. "You had me worried there, for a moment."

"Are you...?"

"I am definitely sending you up!" she replied, with a grin. "Don't you just love it!"

"I surely do."

She refrained from snapping, "Don't... talk like that. Talk like a regular person." She smiled, then, and turned and went on her way, without saying a single word. Back to her office, to think things through. She'd just leave that pic with Creep in case he got any sudden and revealing insights.

.

At lunchtime, in the dining hall, she walked up to him and leaned in and asked, "Want to know what I dreamed about last night?" She even freaked herself out, then, but she tried not to pull a face in case she freaked 'Theodore' out too. She just smiled, waiting for his reply, and, creepily, he put up a hand to touch her cheek with his fingertips.

"The light," he said.

"That's him, isn't it? That's my brother! He's the frickin' Mysterious Healer!"

He frowned, letting his gaze travel to the floor, and she was actually surprised that he didn't stop and ogle her for a bit, just because that was the sort of thing he'd usually do. "Can we go outside?" he asked, and she realised he was looking at her again.

"Let's."

They walked out to the parking lot, then out over the lawn, toward the forest. "I don't know about any Healer," he told her, as they were crossing the lawn, "mysterious or otherwise, but you're right; you did feel some connection with your twin."

"And, what does it mean? Is he around here, someplace, close by? Or... somewhere else, farther away? Or don't you know? Or won't you say? Say something."

He stopped, frowning at the air in front of him. "I think... you had to part."

"Yeah, I've already got that," she replied, starting to feel her patience waning. "But what about right now? Can you tell anything about where he is right now? Even if he's just... far away?"

Lyle didn't look at her, he just went on frowning at nothing really. "You called him... Bobby. But there are other names. Other names that other people call him by."

Parker laughed. "Yeah, yeah. Bobby, is it? No, that's that loony kid. Don't get them confused. I want to know about my _twin_."

"Yes. Bobby."

She snorted. "No. My twin."

"Bobby is your twin. Or as close to as they've been in many, many years."

She narrowed her eyes. "You! You are having me on."

"They were... they were one, before. They were called... Noah."

"Yes, that's the kid's name. But he's not Bobby."

"No, and yes. Then they were Tory, then they were Bobby. Mother thought she might name them Polly, but it turned out they weren't a she and Polly's a female's name."

"No shit! Nooo! Polly! It's perfect!" She shook her head. "Polly!" she muttered darkly, to herself. "Polly and Melody! Oh yeah, I really believe that!"

"For your mother's father, who was named Paul."

"I don't know Catherine's father's name, idiot. She came over from Ireland as a wee thing with her sister; even she didn't know her father's name."

"Brother."

"Sister."

"Brother."

"Dorothy!" Parker groused.

"Dorothy was her mother. Benjamin was her brother. They were twins."

"Benjamin?"

"Yes. But that wasn't the name Dorothea gave to him. It was changed to Benjamin here, in the US, and before that, it was Benedict, and... something else again, before that."

Parker frowned, nodding. "Right, because they were wards of the state."

"Yes."

"And Dorothy's name wasn't really Dorothy, or Dorothea?"

"I am unsure. Her mother's name was Docila."

"That doesn't sound very Irish, to me."

He frowned. "That's all I have."

"But why is my twin's name Bobby?"

"I suppose you'd have to ask him that," Lyle replied, as they finally reached the tree line and stepped into the forest.

"Yeah, but no. Here's the thing, the thing you're missing, or pretending to miss- anyway, you're Bobby. That's the name your adoptive parents gave you when they whisked you away into the night. Robert, Bobby. And you're not my twin, you're just pretending to be - and that imbecile Courtland told you you were. He even told you your name was Theodore, which it isn't, and never was. That's my twin's name. You're Bobby."

He frowned, not buying it. "No, Bobby is Bobby."

"It's called cloning. Spooky shit it is, but you get used to it. The kid I met back at that Hell hole was a clone. You're the real Bobby. The first Bobby, anyway."

"He's not a clone."

"Pff! He is too! Don't fuckin' argue with me, okay, because I fucking know. He is a clone and that's the frickin' end of it. End of discussion!"

"He's not a clone. He's your twin."

She widened her eyes. "Then wouldn't that make _you_ my twin _too_, smartass?"

He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again. "Why?"

"Cos... he's _your_ clone." She prodded a finger in his direction: You, mister; your clone.

"He's not a clone, he's... something new."

"Something old, something new; something borrowed, something blue, eh?"

"Yes, exactly. Old, but new, and borrowed, and b...lue." He looked up at her suddenly. She didn't notice he was shaking until he spoke, and it was there, in his voice. "I don't want to be him."

"You don't want to be my brother, you mean!" she scowled.

"I would dearly love to be your brother; anyone's brother, in fact, but I don't want to be him."

"Well, tough! You don't get to choose." She sighed, swatted his arm lightly. "Don't sweat it, hatty, you're not my brother, anyway. You just think you are because that's what Lyle wanted you to think. He finally came up with a smart little plan to convince me that we're twins. Yet, here I stand, unconvinced. What a tragedy! He was always a conniving bastard! I'd have pushed him off a cliff any day, Theo. Any fuckin' day."

Lyle hadn't been listening, though. He wasn't looking too happy, either. "We have... something... in our brain."

She raised her eyebrows. "Yeah, no shit. That _is_ my brother's. That's probably why you think you're him. It's called an 'upgrade'. It's fuckin' shit, but you know, not everybody thinks so. Me, a couple o' others; not everybody."

"Bobby doesn't have it."

"Your clone doesn't have it," she corrected him, "and he wouldn't, either."

"He's not a clone. He's... a projection... I think. A physical manifestation of a mental projection."

She rolled her eyes. "If that's what you want to believe."

"They damaged him. My... daughter!"

"Somebody hurt Silvie?" she asked suddenly.

"Yes. Your brother, your real twin, made her better again. Kyle's angel was a Healer too, just didn't know it, has another name, _too many names_." He was frowning again. "Why do I think I'm your twin? Why? H-healed you, and Mimi, and the babies, and Z-Zoe, and Kyle. But not Jimmy. And others, too; but not Jimmy. Jimmy went away. But- but, that's right! That's right, isn't it? Because, Bobby isn't your twin. I'm not your twin. And... Jimmy was _my_ friend."

"He was your friend." She sighed. "Kyle's dead. He's dead. Okay. Yeah. What... what babies?"

"Oh! Not... not your baby. Grace... she... couldn't hang on. She had to go."

Parker's face went white. Gr-Grace? Grace was the name she'd have given to her baby, had it not died in the accident that she'd thought had also killed her best friend, Mimi. But... then, according to _Lyle_, the baby had been a she. She felt a sudden urge to take out her gun and shoot him dead. She didn't, of course, she just felt like it might make her feel better. "Shut up!" she spat.

He frowned.

"What babies, you fucking freak? Answer the Goddamn question or, so help me God, I will shoot you! And you _will_ die!"

"Geronimo, Cindy Cindy and Sanford."

"G- Jarod's clone. The Mysterious Healer Healed Jarod's clone? Why?"

"Would have died. Otherwise. Doesn't..." he waved a hand dismissively, "work, this thing, cloning. Not as such. They'd have died otherwise, and... they're family. Not with your family, not with children; this doesn't happen. They live."

"Kyle is dead," she told him, making her eyes big. "You- you fucking wasted him! He's dead. Believe it."

A loud squealing sound had her covering her ears. Oh, what the fuck?

"Why did they do that?" Lyle asked, wide-eyed, as though he had no fuckin' idea in the world, as though it was vitally important that he knew, and just in case she didn't get it, he thought it was cruel and unusual; big emphasis on unusual.

"Because... that's what they do when there's someone whose heart is stuffed and they need a new one; they give them some dead person's, if they can."

"They cut it out. Like the Healer. Sydney didn't like to look at it. It felt... wrong. He didn't like Jarod being there. They shouldn't have taken it. They broke its heart. You don't give someone's heart... to someone else! We have our own! We can... can... It's not a machine. You can't just give it a new part. There are all sorts of... other things involved. Connections. You can't do that."

"They do." She laughed. "That really freaks you out, doesn't it?"

Rather than answer her question, he said, "Kyle has a new heart, too. Your brother gave him one. I apologise for... frightening you. I'll try not to do it again."

"You do that. And, whilst you're at it, try getting a new brain, too, cos the one you've got now is on the way out. Upgrades: nasty little buggers, they are." She got closer, suddenly, and prodded him in the chest. "You do not... just give someone... a new heart! Not the way you're blathering on about it. Kyle is dead! You can't undo that one! He's dead, he's gone, he's ancient history! Face up to it! He's _dead_!"

Lyle nodded. "He doesn't remember, either. Just the light, in his dreams, like your dream. Just like that. If he remembered, that might be bad."

"He's dead!"

Lyle made a face, then laughed.

_Someone's lost their lollie_, Parker thought. _Again._

"There's a girl," he told her in a whisper, as though _he_ was a girl, sharing some piece of top-secret gossip with a friend.

"A girl. Whoa. Like there've never been girls before. Trust me, there's been lots of girls. Tons of girls." She nodded. "You like the girls."

"She doesn't like Bobby. She thinks he's strange and funny, the strange-funny, not the ha-ha funny. She'd never think he was ha-ha funny. They were in college together, sort of. Sort of. She's someone's daughter and he's got a father, too, but not the same father. It's a bit funny, ha-ha, but it's not, too. She's someone's daughter, and he's someone's son."

"No!" Parker gasped.

"Yes! Exactly! I know! Your Bobby is very, very strange. He's a very strange boy."

Parker poked him in the chest with a finger. He was so dense! "You're Bobby."

"No. No. I'm not a girl. I'm a... man. I'm not a girl."

"Bobby's not a girl, either, whimwit."

"Yes, he is. Sometimes. Sometimes, he is. He can be. But... but she doesn't know, so you can't tell her." He shook his head. "She doesn't know. Bobby likes her. He thinks she's nice. She's nice, not like... them. She doesn't hurt people, she saves them! She saved Bobby's friends. She helped them. They don't know, either. Bobby would never tell her. He's sad because she can't... she can't live, too, when Bobby's living, not her, not his sister, but it's better than people hurting her, it's better than getting a scrubby scrubbing thing and scrubbing her out, making her a part of them, because Bobby likes her the way she is - she's a good person. She wouldn't hurt anyone else like Bobby di-"

"Shut- shut up!" Parker cut in. "Shut up! Bobby is not a girl. He's an Empath, like you are. So sometimes he gets confused about who he is. Maybe he'd rather be this girl, who knows, but that doesn't mean they're the same-"

"Not the same, but... from the same... heart, or... the energy."

"They don't have the same soul, Goddamn it!"

"Yes! That's what they have! The same... soul..." He trailed away, looking at the ground. "Bobby doesn't want to be a girl. He- he likes being a boy. But he couldn't help it, and it's not her fault. It wasn't her fault. It was... an accident. He couldn't help it."

She snorted at the stupid tears in his eyes.

"It hurt, and that sucks. Bobby didn't like it. She doesn't remember the pain, when she... comes. She forgets it. But Bobby remembers. He doesn't like the pain." He looked at his hand, turning it over then back again several times. "She's a nurse. She's a good nurse. But she's not a Healer. She fixed us, but she's not a Healer. She's a nurse. She thinks it's the right thing to do to help other people."

Parker glared at him. "She Healed your hand? That's why you've got your little friend back? You... magicked yourself into a chick and back again, and somehow you got your thumb back?"

He nodded, staring at the scar in his palm. "It doesn't work on scars. And it doesn't work on..." he pointed to his head, "the thing. The colonly. But it works on missing bits."

Parker snorted. "I'll bet it doesn't work on missing heads!"

"I don't think it would, either."

"Oh! Wow! The smack's starting to wear off now, is it? Finally!" She wiped a hand over her brow in mock relief. She laughed. "You are one sick puppy, I've gotta say that for you!"

"Yes, you're right," he replied, glancing back toward the Centre. "We should be getting back. You should have something to eat, before lunch is over." He headed off, toward the building, but stopped and turned back. "By the way, you wouldn't happen to know who it was I was seeing, do you?"

"Yeah, Dr. Brown's your man," she said.

"I was seeing a man? Are you sure?"

She frowned. "What? What! Oh- no! No, I mean Brown's your doctor. He's the doctor you've been seeing. Y-" She shook her head. "No, you mean... sexually. No, I wouldn't happen to know. Why? You worried you might have eaten her, or something?"

He frowned uncomfortably.

He was very good at frowning, this one, she thought.

"I promised Lulu it was over; we weren't going to see each other anymore. I- I think I should tell her, whoever she is, so she doesn't get the wrong idea. It's the right thing to do, I think."

Parker shrugged. "'Whoever she is'," she replied. "You're the Empath. We never talked about that kind of shit, anyway. You were always just... making disgusting passes at me, or... with the eyes, and the inappropriate thoughts. I wouldn't have talked to you about that shit if you'd paid me. It would only get you started on how great we'd be 'together'."

He frowned again. "You're my sister. I care for you... as a sister." He sighed, shook his head. "Ah, but I'm forgetting, I'm insane."

"Yup!"

"Don't worry," he told her now, "I promised Lu I wouldn't... go around with other women in that manner, anymore, and... I won't. And..." He looked at her, trying not to wince too much. "You're my sister. That's... just..." He shivered. "I know we used to share our dreams, among other things, but that's... pushing it a bit. Mind you, I don't understand where that impulse comes from; I want you to be happy... with... with someone who makes you happy, who you make happy... and that is not _your brother_. I know who you'd like it to be, and it's not me." He nodded. "I just wanted you to know I don't think of you that way... a-anymore. I'm ha-" he nodded again, "happy with Lulu."

_Happy with your lunacy_, she thought silently, and was surprised, but mostly freaked out, when he came over and hugged her.

"You're my sister, okay. Slap me if I try anything. Or, feel free to push me off some cliff." He smiled.

She widened her eyes, glad when he let go of her, and walked back to the building. She wasn't hungry, but she was. Her stomach was hungry, but another part of her felt kinda sick, kinda like decontaminating herself. She decided she'd do best to eat, first, before anything else, or she might pass out. She didn't really like the sounds of that, passed out in the shower, naked. Any creep could walk in and take a geek.

As she was thinking this, Reston walked past, on the way back from his Beemer, and nodded.

She glanced at Lyle as though to say, "You remember what you said; you promised you'd leave off me. So keep your sticky eyes off me or I'll sic my Reaper onto you!"

Reston only smiled, confident that he was safe. After all, Lyle didn't remember ever having had that conversation with him. He wouldn't do nothin' to him.

_Jerk!_ she thought. _Leery effing creep. Go leer at the Chairman's personal assistant, whilst you're at it! Or Lucy!_ She sniggered to herself. _Good old Lucy._ She'd whoop his ass into next year, if he ever tried that shit on her, for sure!

The instant she stepped foot in the dining hall, Sydney was there like a flash. "What did you say to him?" he whispered, as though she'd done something naughty enough to get her sent to the naughty corner, in other words, something very, very naughty.

"Nothing. He just told me he thinks of me as a sister, not as a... potential love interest." She tried not to cringe at that. "Cute, but I didn't believe his skanky ass. I let him _think_ I did, but I didn't." She snorted. "You know he's really an idiot, at heart."

"Not as much as you think," Sydney replied, and passed her the tray he'd been holding.

She grinned. "Thanks!"

"And eat the fries, too. I don't care if they're 'fattening'."

"Nah, I'm gonna feed them to Theodore, that's what I'mma gon' do."

He laughed. "No, you're not."

"Spoilt sport."

"Yep. You got me."

She grinned, and sat down to eat her lunch, whilst she still had time, before Broots appeared with another mysterious lead on Jarod. She laughed suddenly. "BTW - he is _so_ insane!"

"Tell me something I don't know," Sydney replied darkly, sitting across the table from her.

.

Her cell phone blaring out Irene Cara's _What a Feeling_ woke her with a start and she blinked, realising that it was dark... she'd bloody been dreaming! She planted her hands over her face and moaned, rolled over and grabbed for her phone. "What?"

"Miss Parker, just one question."

_Jarod_, she thought darkly. The digital clock on her night stand said it was 4:26. "Hit me!"

"If you were... locked up, how'd you text me to ask me to come pick you up?"

"I didn't."

"Right. Ah, because you don't have my number, either, do you?"

"No."

"Then... who did?"

"Maybe Bobby did."

"And how would he have got my number?"

"He's an Empath," she replied.

"If he was that good, don't you think he'd have found me already?"

"He wasn't looking for you, Jarod," she said.

"Why wasn't he? If he's Raines's toy..."

She shook her head. "Unless he isn't."

"Lyle's toy, then. What's the difference?"

"No. Not his, either."

"Whose, then?"

"Maybe he ditched the old crowd? Ran away?"

"And Raines wouldn't have got Lyle onto his case? Especially seeing as the kid's his clone, you'd think he'd be able to find him in a snap."

"The kid's an Empath. He'd have been able to Block him, too. It's a two-way street."

"I don't buy that. What if the kid was working for the Tower, all along, and he only wanted you to think he was helping you?"

"But he _did_ help me. I got out."

"But why?"

"What do you mean 'why'?"

"Why call me to pick you up? Why let you go, in the first place? Perhaps they thought... something would happen, between us. Something involving babies being made."

Parker snorted. "Cute, Jarod! Oh, I'm sure that was it! They're really just hanging out for us two to shack up and make ourselves a litter of Ultimate Pretenders! You know, me a Pretender, you a Pretender, Ultimate Pretender babies! Come on, like they couldn't have cooked me something up themselves. With you, your old man, _Kyle_, or creepy Ally." She laughed. "Oh man! They'd be some twisty babies!"

"They made Alex the way he was," Jarod told her.

"Shut up! He let them make him like that."

"What else was he supposed to do?" Jarod asked. "It happened to Kyle, too. I'm just lucky I got Sydney. If I'd been given to Raines or Phil, I'd probably have gone insane, too."

"Oh rubbish!"

"I don't think it's rubbish at all, Parker."

She huffed. "Anyway, it was Granville that made Kyle nuts, to begin with. Raines only went with the flow. Granville got it all going."

"So Granville was the one who told him angels were real, too?"

"Probably."

"Nutter!"

"Come on, the guy's typical Tower! They're all insane! It's practically a requirement of the job."

"Yeah."

"Yeah!"

"So what's happening with this kid now? What's he up to now? We didn't... make any babies. What next?"

"He's not theirs. He's something old."

"Of course he's theirs!"

"No, he's my twin."

Jarod laughed. "He's Lyle's 'twin'!"

"That's just who he chose to appear to me as, stoopit! He's my twin! Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue!"

"It's not your wedding."

Parker snorted. "He still is. Don't you get it? The Doctor was Amy's imaginary friend. My twin was mine."

"If Amy's imaginary friend was real, then he can't have been imaginary, too. And you didn't have an imaginary friend, that was more of Raines's bullshit. I bet he was the one behind that."

"He wasn't. He didn't sic Timmy onto me. He'd just got Timmy then, and he didn't have any other Empath, before then. How could it be one of his little games, unless Daddy asked the Tower to lend him one of their Empaths, and I doubt it. Daddy wouldn't have gone along with that shit, then. The only reason he let me meet you was because he knew damn well that I was lonely, _that you'd never hurt me_. He didn't let me meet Alex or Kyle cos they were questionable of temperament. You were safe. My imaginary friend _was_ real, and he was my twin. I remember. He looks like Noah, like the piccie I have of the bub. That's why Daddy... thought it would be best for me to have something for my problem, in case Momma got the idea that my brother was still alive..."

"I'm sensing there's a _but_ coming up real soon," Jarod put in.

"But Raines didn't want me to have any pills. He..."

"He what, Parker?"

"Left."

"He left the Centre?" Jarod asked sceptically.

"He came back when they took me off the meds. He said that with Momma's medical history, it wasn't the right thing to do giving me that sort of medication, that it wasn't safe for kids anyway, but for me, it was... worse. It was like saying, 'You have this problem, okay, because, really, if you didn't, would we really be giving you pills for it?' And he didn't like that. I... I don't know, maybe because he's my dad. He didn't think I had to end up going the way of Momma, that it was _my_ choice! It wasn't some crazy scheme of his, it was just... I was a child! He believed in me, then. He wasn't as fucked-up as he is now."

"Your imaginary friend was a girl."

"No he wasn't! Gods, you looked at my pictures!" How embarrassing! "_He_ was a _he_! You only thought he was a she because of the curly hair."

Jarod snorted. "Bobby had curly hair."

"So did Sydney."

"Jacob didn't."

"I don't."

Jarod sighed. "I don't get it. He _was_ a funny kid. Elsie was right. One minute he was a normal kid, the next he was someone else."

"Yeah, nah. He tried to off himself when he was _six_! Elsie was a bitch. The signs were right there, but she just ignored them. Hubby was mean to her, too, so why should she stick up for the kid if it'd only get her hurt; why take the hurt for both of them? She wasn't his _biological_ mother! She didn't think he was worth it."

"You don't know that, Parker."

"Then do you have a better explanation?"

"Lyle sticks up for her."

"He _has_ to. He can't buy that she abandoned him, too; not both of them. He wouldn't be able to take it, otherwise."

"Sure."

"You said it yourself! He was a _kid_! Kids are funny. When he was young, he put up with his Dad's shit; it wasn't until he was older that he started to rebel."

"That was Raines's doing," Jarod told her.

"Except it wasn't. Raines isn't that good. Drugs or no drugs, he's not _that_ good. Even if he'd told Bobby he was his real dad, even if he'd promised to take him away from the Bowmans and give him everything he'd ever wanted, Bobby wouldn't have accepted. Empath, Jarod. He'd formed a bond with these guys; he knew what he was doing. He had to detach from them; he had to break the connection. It had to be something drastic, something unmendable. It wasn't just about sticking it to Dad. That's why he chose Jimmy; don't you get it? His best friend. Someone who loved him. In his mind, Jimmy would understand, would want to help."

"No, it was because he could fool Jimmy; he had access to Jimmy, and Jimmy was his age, and a guy."

Parker sighed heavily. "Are you even listening to me, stoopit! Empath! It's a hard life, being that messed up; you can't help but form bonds to people you really wish you could just simply hate. But it's never simple, being an Empath. Nothing comes easily. There's always a price to pay."

"Are you sticking up for the lunatic, now, Parker?"

"No. Not for him. I'm saying it's not right to... to look at it from one angle and one angle only. Angelo was my friend, too. I don't get to say, 'Yeah, those guys creep the fuck outta me, end of story'."

"Lyle is not Angelo. They're two different people."

"We're all different people, Jarod. And we're all... just people. We're all _people_; underneath all of the muck, we're all _equal_. Even fucked-up Alex should have had someone on his side; even he should have had that chance, as much as anyone. But Phil was never on his side - never! The same thing with Kyle!"

"You're Catherine, now?"

Parker scowled, knowing Jarod couldn't see her expression, but feeling pissed enough not to care.

"I hear what you're saying, Parker, but we really have other concerns, at this moment."

She snorted. "Fuck your other concerns!"

"Miss Parker, try a little perspective. You can't save him. You know that. I couldn't save Alex. Don't you think I'd have loved to have done so, if it had been possible, but, ultimately, it was Alex's choice, and he made his choice."

"He was sick!"

"It was still _his_ choice."

"Bobby didn't try to kill himself."

Jarod laughed. "Yeah, he did," he said.

"No, he didn't. He'd have hesitated. I'm betting it was Elsie, when she still gave a damn. She tried to save him, to do the right thing. She made sure not to hesitate, to make it worse for him."

"And what about when he tried to drown himself?"

"He fell in. He can't swim. He didn't mean to drown himself."

"He cuts himself now."

"He didn't then. It was Elsie."

"Yeah."

Parker laughed. "She did care, once. Like you said, Lyle sticks up for her. There's got to be a reason for it. I'm telling you!"

"And I heard you, Parker." He sighed. "Getting back to the kid."

"Getting back to my _twin_," Parker rephrased.

"Whatever. Getting back to him..."

"You have to help him."

"No I don't."

"I'd like you to."

"You can like me to as much as you want, Parker-"

"You're my friend."

"I'm not suicidal."

"He's the Mysterious Healer. You have to help him. He Healed Emily."

"Bull!"

"That's why she didn't die, when Lyle shoved her out that window. What if... one of us ever needs Healing again. We'd be on our own, unless we could find us a Healer and convince he or she to join our... You'd be on your own, anyway. The Tower would probably get me a Healer, like they did for Alex."

"Alex is a Pretender."

"I'm a Pretender."

Jarod sighed. "Yeah," he agreed tiredly.

"But you don't just want any Healer. You want the Mysterious Healer. No signature. Nobody can tell you've been Healed."

"I'm sorry, Parker, but I just don't buy it. Wherever you got this idea, I'm betting it's just Lyle's clone having a bar of you."

"You can't let this happen - he's my twin!"

"Yeah, yeah."

"What about Emily? Lyle and Emily have Convergence. If they hurt Lyle's clone, it might hurt her, too!"

"Nope. I don't believe that's how it works. Lyle is Emily's Convergence partner, not his clone. Say you and I had Convergence, Parker; that wouldn't mean you had Convergence with Mo, too. Or if Sydney and Michelle had Convergence... nothin' to do with Jacob."

"Lyle's on his way out, anyway. Upgrades."

"Don't remind me, genius. I hate those fuckin' things! They poisoned my baby brother with those shitty things, too!" She coughed. "Jean-Paul!"

"I have no idea what you're on about."

She nodded. "Hang on! Hang on! Jean-Michael, Paul: Jean-Paul! R-Raines isn't our Dad! Jacob or Sydney is!"

"Uh-huh. How'd we get onto this topic again?"

"I dunno. I just remembered something," Parker replied. She sighed heavily. "I am so confused right now! They're right, you know. Empaths! They'll do your head in, if you let them!"

"Yeah."

"Benjamin _Theodore_! Ben's Momma's brother! Argh, yes! Ben. Lyle _is_ my brother! You're a genius!"

"That's what they say."

Parker frowned. "Or... at least, my cousin! We _are_ related. I feel sick!"

"We... we have some kind of connection," she went on. "I'm sure of it. No matter if Bobby isn't really Bobby but it Theodore... Noah. There's still something there. Because... he and I are related."

"What do you mean Jean-Paul?" Jarod asked, suddenly. "Harm says that's Hubertus's dad's name."

"Nickname," Parker corrected. "She likes the French ones. I guess the Belgian aren't bad, either."

"They have Convergence! You said... Emily and Lyle! Lyle's Hubertus's dad... Jean-Paul."

"Paul was Momma's dad's name," Parker filled him in.

"Yeah?"

"Apparently so."

"So what's this got to do with Miller?"

"Lyle looks like him. Because Ben's probably his dad! And Ben's Momma's brother! Theodore is his middle name, not Thomas. It got mixed up somehow and he just left it like that."

"Why?"

"I don't know."

"Hmm... But, you know, there's something you're overlooking here, Mel. Harmony called Lyle 'Jean-Paul', you said. Lyle didn't call himself 'Jean-Paul'."

She frowned. Oh cripes! He was right. "Still, it makes some sense..."

"Well, yes, but..."

"Yeah."

"That sucks."

"I think I'm starting to see why people don't trust Empaths."

"Hmm..."

"Poor Angelo. He's not like those other Empaths, at all."

"As far as we know," Jarod added.

Parker sighed heavily. "Yeah."

"So Hubertus might be an Empath?"

"I _know_! It's cruel!"

"It makes sense."

"What does?"

"Sydney being your dad. Remember when we thought we had Convergence, then it turned out it was only Residual Convergence, from hanging out with people who _did_ have Convergence."

"I remember."

"Remember when we couldn't figure out who it could be who had Convergence, who we'd both have spent enough time with for it to rub off on us?"

"Me, with Momma; you, with Sydney," she finished.

"Exactly."

"Holy S!"

"Exactly."

"Do you think Raines guessed it?"

"Why would he?"

"He's the T-Corp lover. He believes in all that crap."

"And so do you."

"I'm not disputing it. But do you think he guessed?"

"What does it matter?"

"I don't know... yet."

"Yet," Jarod mused, letting his mind work over the idea, himself.

"We need more! It doesn't make any more sense than it ever did! We need more."

"Tell me again, how do Lyle and Emily have Convergence?"

"I dunno, but they do. I... sense it. He's my... thing, relative."

"'Thing'."

"Thing suits him," she defended herself.

"Oh, it does!" Jarod agreed, a grin in his voice. He sighed, suddenly. "Damn, I owe Mom an apology."

"Why?"

"I was bitchy with her."

"'Bitchy'?"

"Let's just call it that, and move on."

"Okay."

"Yeah?"

"No!" She laughed, then sobered. "Yeah. It's between you and your mom. Just don't forget."

"No."

Parker stifled a yawn with her hand.

"I guess this means we can't 'put him out of his misery'."

"Lyle? No, I guess not. It's too risky. We wouldn't want to hurt Emily."

"Is she okay?"

"For now."

"Do you think he knows they have Convergence?"

"He'll know. He'll _have known_," she corrected. "He didn't shoot her, after all. Maybe he..."

"So why'd the Mysterious Healer Heal Em?"

"Because Ethan's my brother, and he's your brother, too. We're family. He's my brother; Em's his family, too."

"You think Lyle knew this, before he tried killing her?"

"Who knows," Parker replied.

"It would be nice to know."

"Christ _yeah_!"

"But he'd have probably have dobbed to Raines, if he'd known."

"Who says he didn't?"

"Yeah," Jarod echoed.

"Hey!" she said suddenly. "You watched it!"

"Part of it. That British show, right?"

"Right!"

"You lot and aliens. If Raines isn't your dad, we can't really blame him for your little alien thing."

She laughed. "Nah, blame Lyle! That one's Lyle's fault - all the way, baby!"

"Why is it Lyle's fault?" Jarod asked, a frown in his voice.

"I met him once, when I was seventeen. He told me he was an alien. It was such a crack-up!" She laughed, remembering how she'd told him she didn't date non-humans. Apparently he hadn't got that, apparently he'd thought 'assimilated human' was as good as human.

"I don't understand that."

"Empath, Jarod. He must've felt like an outsider, growing up. Alien."

"Hmm... I still can't help."

Parker shook her head, then it clicked. "Why not? Come on...!"

"I'm sorry, I don't buy it. You've done enough, Parker. You've done everything you could possibly do to convince me, but I don't buy it."

"He's still my brother! Or cousin!"

"It's not enough. If it was Lyle in his place, do you really think I'd care any more?"

"You'd wanna," she told him. "Convergence partners," she reminded him.

"That wouldn't bother me."

"It would bother Emily."

"She's strong."

"Doesn't matter, this is Convergence. Nobody really knows what can happen. And Lyle's an Empath. It's bound to impact on their connection somehow."

"So I'd get myself an Empath, to Block the connection."

"You'd hurt Emily."

"I told you, she's strong."

"There are some things you don't mess with, Jarod."

"I don't even believe in Convergence, Parker."

"He's not Lyle!" she implored. "We might still be able to save him!"

"Not from what you've told me."

"Pl-"

"Don't," he told her, and hung up.

She stared at her cell phone but it was true: Jarod really had hung up on her. She threw her phone to the floor and lay back down, tears stinging her eyes. If Bobby really _was_ her twin, _someway_, _somehow_, she'd bloody abandoned him! She'd done it again.

.

"And when you learn to talk, you can choose a name," Melody told the little boy, with a nod. She was so very, very excited; so happy to have a friend. If she'd ever had a younger sibling, she'd have loved for it to be him. He didn't talk much now (well, at all, really) but she was teaching him. She read to him, all the time; told him about things. Soon, he'd been talking; soon, they'd have so much to talk about. She'd ask him what it was like, where he lived; if he had any other friends; and what about his mom and dad; did he have a brother or sister, pets? Why didn't he speak?

Very soon, she thought, all of her questions would be answered. She couldn't wait.

.

The boy couldn't be trusted. They knew this well. You didn't take in the enemy and expect it to end well. But they knew what to do, and they'd still get to keep the boy, they wouldn't have to give him up. He could have been relaying all of their secrets to the enemy, as they spoke, debating over what to do, how to handle things. There was nothing else to do, but to do. They left the table, left their chairs, empty cups and mugs. The door closed one last time, the room was empty. Footsteps echoed from outside, shoes striking on the floor. Work, work to be done. Plans, plans to be executed. The lights went out in the room, leaving behind only darkness.

.

Parker got into work early and made straight for Heathrow Lounge, for a decent coffee. She found a seat on the empty couch and listened to classical music on the radio. She was there to smile when Broots came in, to say, "Hey!" and catch his look of surprise. They stood together to make coffees (she'd finished her first hours ago, she was due another).

Other people drifted in, over time, but it wasn't until Lyle arrived that she stood up, deciding it time to leave. She almost didn't catch the look of discomfort in Broots's eyes, but she'd learnt to take notice, to really take notice, so she saw it. She made no comment, but went to put her mug in the sink to be washed later.

She didn't quite get that far. The mug slipped from her hands and banged on the floor but didn't break. She didn't notice, or care; the pain in her head felt like she was going to die. She strained to peek through watery eyes, to make out Lyle. Was he dying? Was it his upgrades? And why did it feel like _she_ was the one dying?

She forced herself to drag in a breath and the pain evaporated, as though someone had clicked their fingers and dropped an "Enough".

When she looked, Lyle was sitting on the floor, breathing heavily.

She stumbled in his direction. "What was that?"

"They were going to hurt him," he breathed, and the look in his eyes said he knew her, he _knew_ her. 'Theodore' was gone; he was Lyle, again.

She tried to ignore the fact that he was shaking so much, but it nagged at her. She had a feeling she knew who he was talking about: her _real_ twin. "What happened?" she snarled.

He didn't look at her, but said, "I'm sorry. You thought he was... He's gone."

She stormed over and dropped to her knees and slapped him. It wasn't good enough for him to say _sorry_; not this time! She didn't think Bobby was her twin - she KNEW! "You don't speak to me!" she hissed. "Ever again!"

She stood up and walked out.

.

They'd made sure to sedate him quite heavily, but even so, the boy had managed to make a break for him; he'd even managed to get out the door. The Reaper had been too stunned to make any move to grab hold of him, to slam the door shut with his telekinesis; too stunned that this kid whose brain he'd had a good go of messing up was still able to stand and make a co-ordinated effort at escape.

The Sweepers were out the door in a wink, after the boy. He wouldn't get far. That was what they all thought.

When they couldn't find him, they didn't understand what had gone wrong. They'd never guess that he'd gone home, that was all.

Winters took out his gun and shot the Reaper in the head. He fell to the floor, dead. None of the Sweepers dared say a word. "Find him!" he breathed, in a voice like frozen steel.

.

Lyle stood on unsteady legs and stumbled to the door; nobody came over to help, not even Broots, who hadn't moved, hadn't even blinked, since Parker had stormed out. The other techs just stood and watched, their expressions all saying the same thing: Yeah, and _stay_ out!

He wiped blood from his nose onto the back of a shaking hand and pushed open the bathroom door.

Fulton started to say, "And you can just take your skanky ass right back out that door, mi-" but anything else she'd been about to say was cut short when the room was filled with bright white light.

.

The Reaper who'd been quietly bleeding onto the expensive carpet stirred, his eyes openingas he drew a wobbly breath.

Winters set his coffee down on the table and took out his gun. "No you don't!" He shot him again.

.

As suddenly as it had come, the light was gone. Fulton realised she was standing right where she'd been before the light had erupted, she hadn't moved a single inch, but Lyle seemed to have collapsed to the floor.

She walked to his side, unsure if she was dreaming or if what she'd just seen was real. She was about to say something about the blood - he'd probably knocked his head on the floor when he'd fallen, though she didn't remember having heard the thud - but she swallowed that thought when he started to cry.

What did she do now? she wondered. Could she, maybe, phone a friend? Or Raines?

She pushed a smile onto her face forcibly and knelt down in front of him, catching his eye. "Hey! Hey, you! It's not the end of the world!"

.

She stood by the wall, rubbing her wrist unneccesarily with a hand. She had no idea what she was going to say, when Raines got there.

Raines arrived with Angelo in tow, which she hadn't expected, or maybe Angelo had tagged along out of some some Empathic curiousity, or to show support for his 'brother'. Raines walked over to talk to her, but Angelo just walked up to Lyle, knelt down on the floor and put his arms around him.

Watching him, Fulton wished she could have done that, wished she could have at least taken his hands in hers, but she hadn't. She hadn't, and Angelo - who everyone said was fucked-up - had. Tears prickled her eyes.

She looked away, to Raines. He was waiting for her to explain, she knew, but she couldn't make anything come out, her throat felt blocked up. She nodded, trying not to dislodge any tears that might have started, and finally managed to get out, "I don't know what happened."

Angelo was humming _Only the Lonely_.

For a fleeting moment, she wanted to ask how that was even possible - people said he was _fucked_-up - then she just wanted to hum along, and maybe cry a bit, too. She thought maybe she was going mad - Had that light been real, or just in her imagination? What was happening to her?

Before she could scream or pull her hair, or stop to cry, Raines placed a hand on her arm and said, "It'll be okay, love" and, for some reason she couldn't explain, she felt comforted by this.

.

Parker sat in her office, in the cold corner; it didn't even matter to her how hard the floor was, how cold the wall was. She wanted to cry, but all she could manage was a funny sort of half-hiccuping, half-hyperventilating thing. She felt like the world's biggest asshole, for her incapacity.

She wanted to go back there and kill Lyle, or at least make a good go of it. She wanted to storm back into Heathrow Lounge, smack Broots away, because she knew he absolutely adored Lyle (he'd have gone to help), and grab her photograph of her _real_ twin back. Maybe even shoot something: the coffeemaker, the Goddamn couch!

Instead, she sat in her office, in the corner like some wimping baby; she couldn't even _hyperventilate_ properly!

She slammed her eyes closed, trying to regain some of her control, _any_ of her control. She was definitely going to go there and shoot that damn couch! It was a stupid couch, and she kinda liked it, and that was _exactly_, exactly, why it had to go! She didn't deserve a comfy couch she could just fall asleep on, as shitty as the place was where it lived, and dream happy dreams. It was an _evil_ couch!

Her ears were sharp, her senses sharp as knives. Someone else was in the room with her. Her eyes snapped open.

The little boy reached a small hand out and placed it over hers, looking into her eyes with his matching blue eyes, the exact same blue as hers.

She moved like an animal pouncing on its prey, its dinner, and snatched the child up into her arms, pulling him close and holding him tightly. She didn't say anything, she just held him, her imaginary friend.


End file.
